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 Posted: Sun Oct 18, 2015 10:09 pm
 "You're welcome." he said and munched on another onion ring before nodding to the question. "Yes, we'll fill her water bottle and put some food in her dish and a treat won't hurt either."
He leaned over a bit and watched, keeping an ear out for chewing. "Out most likely." he paused. "I'm going to assume they charmed the box to resist gnawing which is why she hasn't tried to do that yet. Any place with any sense should have those kinds of boxes if they're not going to let you use decent carriers that you can rent to get your new pet home." Although to be fair that was partially his fault. He should have brought Charo's carrier, but that would have given things away and it wouldn't fit in his satchel very well.
"Well get back to your room soon."
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Posted: Sun Oct 18, 2015 10:45 pm
"Well yeah, but I mean food-wise." He shrugged.. AH, so that was why she wasn't chewing. Magic sure was useful... He honestly couldn't wait until he could start using it. It wouldn't be for a few years yet, but still! He was sure he'd be very good at it. Come to think of it.. he looked to Vaden, at least having the decency to finish the bite in his mouth before asking, "Are you good at magic?"
A little out of the blue, but he'd never seen Vaden use any... Or talk about it. Geists were supposed to be pretty good at magic, weren't they? Generally speaking, anyway.
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Posted: Sun Oct 18, 2015 11:07 pm
"It is possible she's just begging, Gany. Most animals will beg when they know someone has food and they think they can get away with it. Like kids." he said teasingly. "She'll be fine until we get back. She probably ate at some point this morning or afternoon so she's probably not that hungry."
Vaden finished off the last of his rings and sipped at his shake. He snorted at the question and shook his head. "No. Not in any capacity. I'm not even particularly good at premade spells." not that he'd used very many to date, but those he had generally had not worked very well and sometimes not at all. "I suppose I'm too practical for magic." he said with a shrug.
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Posted: Sun Oct 18, 2015 11:22 pm
"Oh.." He blinked, then made a face, "Heeyy... I don't beg." He huffed, almost offended but he did on some level realize that was Vaden's way of joking. He started on the fries, almost done with his entire meal at this point. Just had the shake left... "Iiiif you say so, I s'pose." He shrugged, then looked back to him with a little squint.
"You aren't? Not even the premade ones??" Now that was confusing. "How come??"
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Posted: Sun Oct 18, 2015 11:36 pm
"No you just glower until someone gives in or you get in trouble." he gave Gany a look daring him to argue. They both knew that was true for the most part. He finished the last of his sandwich and balled up the paper and put it back on the tray and waited for Gany to finish so he could bus it.
Vaden shrugged. "Some people just aren't good at magic. There doesn't have to be a reason why they aren't. I can do exactly what the instructions say, but half the time it doesn't work. Most of the people I know back home can't use magic, or can only use very little bits of it. You're a little spoiled here being around so many magically inclined people. In fact the instructor that taught me magical theory was not apt in the slightest."
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Posted: Sun Oct 18, 2015 11:41 pm
he finished off the fries, then picked up the little portable milkshake cup and started sipping, listening to Vaden as he explained. The glowering thing earned an eyeroll, but no verbal objections. Still, Gany's eyerolling skills were practically on the level of speech anyway.
"Really? How come people talk like Geists are really good at magic then?" He tilted his head, taking a break from the shake so he wouldn't get a freeze or anything. "'Cause it sure seems like everyone thinks y-we are in my classes."
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Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2015 9:22 am
He ignored the eyeroll, but took the gesture as a sign of acknowledgement to his previous statement.
He sipped at his shake. "Yes, some Geists are very good at magic, they not only have a very good grasp of the natural talents we have like disappearing and teleportation, but they're capable spell workers as well. However, our race is sometimes a little stubborn and think that because low level magic is easy, that all of it should be easy and it isn't. Magic like many other disciplines takes a lot of study and practice. On the flip side, we're just as likely to have children that are headblind, meaning lacking any obvious magical talent, as any other race or not bothering to train up because it just doesn't interest us."
He shrugged. "I stopped randomly going invisible at a very young age, and even before I knew I lacked any magical talent, magic never interested me anyway, so I don't feel at any particular disadvantage just because I can't use it. Remember, just because you can use magic doesn't mean it'll make your life any easier than someone who can't. Magic is just a skill and it has to be used wisely like everything else."
He took another big sip from his cup and finished putting their trash on the tray. "Are you ready to go?" he asked.
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Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2015 9:49 am
He listened, frowning... He'd experienced a few "disappearing" episodes, though usually it was just his arms, down where his tendrils were. Did that mean he wasn't going to be particularly good at it? Hm. "So even if you're not naturally very good at it you can get better if you practice?" He tilted his head. It wasn't that he wanted to be a powerful magician or something, but he had sort of wondered if one could combine illusion charms with clothing.... That was what he wanted to do so badly.
"Oh... Well I don't want it for that reason." He shrugged, then nodded to his last question. "Yeah, I'm done." He set the empty milkshake cup on the tray, then moved the little basket that had come with his food to it as well before he slid off of his seat. He then retrieved Rubelite's box from under the bedding package.
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Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2015 2:47 pm
"Sometimes practice can help, but sometimes no matter what you do you're never going to be good at a task." he paused and tried to think of an example. "Take for example...any of the arts really, singing, drawing, playing an instrument, you can practice until you make yourself hoarse or your hands bleed, but all the practice in the world isn't going to help if you're tone deaf, lack a sense of proportion, or have no sense of rhythm. I know adults tell kids to follow your dreams and that you can do or be anything, but sometimes your own abilities are going to fail you and you're just not going to be good at something, no matter how badly you want it. I know that's a hard truth, but it is the truth. Learning your own limitations can be hard, but it's accepting them and learning to work with what you got and improving those skill sets you do have that help you figure out who and what kind of person you are."
He let out a sigh after his little speech and wondered if Gany was going to argue over it. He took a moment to bus the tray and give it back to the girl behind the window before going back and putting the bedding back in the big bag with the rest of the supplies and started walking back towards campus. It was only a few blocks from this point, so no sense in wasting more money on bus fare when the sun was still up and the weather was decent.
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Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2015 3:05 pm
He stared at Vaden while he talked, half listening, half wanting to just tell him to shut up. Of course he had to use the arts as an example. Why couldn't he have used something like math? He wasn't about to tell him this little speech was nerve wrecking. He was still a kid, so of course his drawings weren't the best but... Well, he'd seen some of the older kids' drawings and they didn't look much better. Nine, he really didn't want to end up like that.
As Vaden stepped away he looked down at Rubelite's box, thinking. What would he want to do if he couldn't draw, sew or do magic? Nothing came to mind, which frustrated him immensely. Stupid Vaden, bringing up the possibility of being a failure before even getting the chance to try. Of course that hadn't been what Vaden meant, but being the child that he was, that was how he had interpreted it.
He turned to follow Vaden as he started down the block, not really aware he was being unusually quiet for having just gotten a speech about life. After a while he finally looked up from Rubelite's box, and over to Vaden. "What are you gonna be when you grow up?"
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Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2015 7:47 pm
It wasn't until they were about half a block that Vaden realized that he may have been a little over harsh. He sometimes forgot that Gany was in fact still a child, a relatively young one at that. Maybe he should of considered what he said better, but even if he'd tried to avoid the little slice of life, Gany would have still insisted that practice made you better, and while sometimes yes that was true, it wasn't always applicable. Sometimes people just didn't have the ability to follow their dreams, because well...they couldn't either from physical or mental limitation. If you can't see you can't be a surgeon, if complex math was beyond your understanding, like fully behind grasp of understanding it, that cut you off from a good portion of the sciences.
He sighed and almost missed Gany's question having been so wrapped up in his own thoughts. "Hmm?" he glanced over. "Oh, I'm expected to succeed my father. Well...actually I don't have a choice. I am going to follow in my father's footsteps and have his job one day." he said then paused. "I'm sorry about what I said...I forget sometimes you're as young as you are, and I say things like I would to someone my own age."
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Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2015 8:27 pm
"Yeah but... what does your dad do?" He tilted his head, frowning. He was pretty sure he'd heard that explanation before, but Vaden always seemed to leave out exactly what it was that his father did... It was probably something important, why else would he be so serious all the time?
"I'm not little." He retorted, rolling his eyes. Despite that having cut deeply, he wasn't going to acknowledge it. No, it was probably better just to not talk about it. "I am pretty grown up so that's why." He shrugged.
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Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2015 8:37 pm
A very slight misstep, a pause and then finally he answered. "He's a very important business man." he said hefting his satchel slightly.
He quickly latched onto the topic change. "Well you're littler than I am, but it is true, you don't act like a lot of kids you're age. You're very serious and you sometimes wander into topics that aren't very childish in tone. I'm used to dealing with adults all the time, not children, so I forget to censor myself or moderate what I should say. You challenge me, so I treat you like a debate partner, when there are times I should treat you more like an inquisitive child and soften the answer to be less...harsh." he sighed. "I am really sorry Gany, I'm not trying to discourage you from doing what you want to do, I just..." he trailed off and focused on walking.
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Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2015 8:49 pm
He narrowed his eyes, the falter did not escape his notice, but he didn't feel like badgering him about it. "What kinda business?" That he did want to know. Vaden didn't really seem like the business type to him... Not that he really knew what that was, it was a sort of a gut feeling that he didn't belong.
"I like the grown-up stuff better. It's more interesting to talk about." He nodded, then fell silent. He wanted to be treated as an equal, but he also didn't want to hear that it just wasn't worth the effort to put work into things. Again, that misinterpretation was just digging right into his subconscious, making itself at home. "You just what?" The question came out before he'd given it much thought, which wasn't out of the norm but if he'd paused he might not have asked. What if the next words that came out of Vaden were even more discouraging?
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Posted: Mon Oct 19, 2015 9:10 pm
"The usual kind. Trade and stocks and all that." he said. "It's complicated." that was a lame answer.
He sighed. "I want you to be able to look realistically at the world sometimes, and see that, yes, life sometimes is a cruel harsh mistress and isn't fair, but just because it is, doesn't mean you should give up. It just means that you needed to learn something. Failure is our best teacher. It teaches us something about ourselves, what kind person we are, how we can improve. Success doesn't teach us that, it just proves to us what we already knew, we were right, and while that is validating, we can't be right all the time." he sighed again. "So...in the event that someday you fail at something, just know that it's not the end of the world. It's just an opportunity to learn and grow and understand something about yourself: strengths, weaknesses," he shrugged. "whatever."
He went quiet again. He didn't know if that had helped or not.
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