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"Teeeeeeeeee-BALL. TEEEEE-BALL." Trance winced a little at the screech of Connor's pre-pubescent squeal. It was his own fault though. He'd PROMISED tee-ball, and god forbid if he didn't deliver he'd have to put up with this nonsense from Con all day.

Crouching down in the dirt in a far corner of the park, he set up the tee-ball stand he'd brought tucked under his armpit. Brightly outfitted in primary colors, like its owner, it was made for toddlers. The oversized ball on top was more of a wiffle ball than anything, though Trance was afraid of the damage Connor might do to it. He was a little strong for his age sometimes. Okay, "a little" was an understatement.

"TEE-BALLLLLLL. Wheresse OUTFIELD, pop?" Connor jiggle-bounce-shuffled from one foot to the other excitedly. He held a bat, plastic, hollow, belonging to the same set as the ball and stand. "HOMERUN." He swung the bat haphazardly, nearly smacking Trance in the shin as he stood up again.

Trance looked around absently at the park. He couldn't see anyone Connor's age...hopefully someone might show up so that they could drain Connor's energy together instead of putting the burden all on him. "Looks like it's just us for the moment. Maybe someone'll show up in a bit. I'll be your outfield for now." He grinned. "Betcha can't get one past me."

Connor smacked the bat against his sneaker, mimicking what he'd seen on real baseball games. "UH-HUH. HOMERUN." He pointed to the sky past Trance and grinned. Trying on a real batting stance, he smacked at the ball awkwardly -and missed completely. Instead of the ball going flying, the stand underneath flipped up and fell over. "Oops." He grinned charmingly.

Con pivoted with the bat in his hand to set the new, potential tee-ball player in his sights, while Trance sighed a sigh of relief. A kid his age! Excellent.

"HI. I'M CON. 'anna TEE-BALL wif me?" The sentence was a little lacking verbs but the gist of it and the utter glee were both still there. He swung the bat in demonstration, then practically shoved it at Elazu before raising his arms and clapping at Trance. "BALL, PEEZ."

Trance tossed the ball lightly to Con, chuckling. "Calm down, Con."

Connor caught the ball nimbly, much better at catch than hitting and placed it carefully on the stand.

"HOKAY. You go now. You..." He pantomimed a swing. "You tee-balled 'fore? Wassur name?"

Con shook the other boy's hand enthusiastically, then pointed at the ball on the stand. "Y'SMACKit, so it FLIES. Annen, annen, we try an' gettit." He ran out in front of the tee into the makeshift infield which was really just Trance standing in some grass. He crouched down a bit, resting his hands on his knees and grinned at Elazu.

"C'MON 'LAZU!" He cheered enthusiastically. If Con was anything, he was all about fair-play. There wasn't such a thing as a team in Con's mind yet. It was all about how much fun you could get out of the game.

"No, thasgood!" Con trotted over from the field to pick up the ball from the short distance it'd rolled. "You did bester than me." He beamed, and put the ball on the tee again. "HOKAY. Again. Y'get..." He squinted at his fingers, trying to count. "THIS MANY TRIES." He held up three fingers. "T-th-three. YAH THREE."

Backing up into the infield again, he smacked one hand each other, a motion that would have had better effect if he'd actually had a glove instead of just his hands. "LESGO. Y'CANDOOIT!"

After "The Incident" (to be documented in Caden's journal shortly), both Ethan and Caden were absolutely beaming. As they briskly walked towards home, though, Caden became exceedingly excited, pointing at an open field in the local park.
"What's up, buddy?"
Ethan looked around, not recognizing what was going on (completely missing the brilliant game of t-ball happening out on the field), and hoped that Caden would give him another clue as to what he wanted. However, Caden merely responded by pouting, stamping his foot on the pavement, and stubbornly pointing toward the horizon. As Ethan was in a rather pleasant mood today, he patted Caden on the head, and the two were off into the distance.
"Well alright then!"

Elazu's eyes seemed to sparkle at Con's mention of the moon. He wondered if he really could hit something that hard. After all, Con had said it so maybe he could! He grinned brightly back at Con before holding out the bat to him.

" Nah I bet you're better! You knew how to play better than I did. Your turn though! I swung three times."

"Hokay!" Con took the bat and set the ball back on the tee. He took his best batter's stance, hoping to impress his new buddy. "IMMA SMACK IT." He wound up and...

STRIKE ONE. His bat cleared the tee entirely, knocking the wiffle ball off, with just the wind of missing it. He grinned and kicked the dirt a bit as he picked the ball back up to set it on the tee. "I'll getter this time."

This time, he hit the ball with a smack off the top. It spun uncertainly on the tee, but Con wasn't done yet. He continued to whirl around in a spin of ridiculous momentum until he spun back around and smacked it again. And this time it flew! A pop ball, it didn't go as far as Elazu's did, hitting the ground in front with a small cloud of dust. "A'RIGHT!" Con grinned, and threw his bat up into the air. Then winced and dodged it when it came back down. "I GOTTIT, DIDJU SEE??!!"

Apparently Caden had seen someone he knew, as well as a couple of strangers, who caused him to stop dead in his tracks. Ethan could barely make out a lanky silhouette of an arm waving frantically at himself and at little Caden. He heard a familiar voice call out for Caden to join in on the tee-ball session, but due to his awful vision, couldn't identify who it was.
"Why don't you go play, Caden?"
Ethan gently pushed the young boy towards what he hoped was the tee-ball game, as Caden reluctantly dragged his (foggy) feet in the ground, not quite leaving a trail.
"We'll be right there!"