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Friendly Conversationalist
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 Posted: Wed Oct 14, 2015 7:40 pm
Who: Aaron, Cadi (alpha lyrae), Amity, and Connor (Arana Kamina)
Where: Pen & Sword Comic & Hobby Shop, in downtown Gambino
When: October 14th, 2015, shortly after 2 PM
Weather: Moderate temperatures with a few clouds spotting the sky, but breezy
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It had all started with a hasty text message on one of the days he was telecommuting, but luckily for Aaron, business had hit the mid-week lull, leaving his afternoon free. He had asked Claire if she wanted to come along but she softly shook her head and said that this was more of his and Cadi's thing than it was hers, and let him go with a smile and well wishes for a good time. His niece's text, riddled with emojis, dropped him the address of the comic shop and a personal message in all caps following read, "THE COMICS ARE CRYING FOR YOU, AARON." While he had sat in the office chair in the living room, spinning in it idly and debating on if he should go, another non-caps plea followed, merely saying, "don't send me to the front lines alone, bro." He had remembered the half-promises he had made when they had talked about comics and how he had promised himself, now that their Raevan was on the way, that it was time to stop being so secretive, and to ditch his niece-in-law just because he was still shaking that off would be more counter-productive than anything. She was new to Gambino, and friendless in the town minus her family, so to back out now would have been exceedingly cruel of him - even when she was also doing him a favor in return by scouting these things out. With a quick change of clothes and a goodbye to his wife, he was in the car and on his way, and in short order he arrived at the small parking space just behind. He had eyed the place several times, with its nice-looking brick exterior and wide glass windows displaying goods and painted portraits of Marvel and DC characters, but he had always talked himself out of going in under the excuse of, 'you're too old,' but he knew that was not the case. In the back of his mind he could hear the voices of his high school friends jeering, and he would keep walking by.
Once the car was parked, he hustled around front where Cadi waited, her long peacoat pulled tightly around her, her leg jiggling impatiently as she leaned against the side of the building.
"Thought you were gonna ditch for a hot second," Cadi replied, her lips flashing into a quick smile when he stopped in front of her. "You been here before? Didn't take you long to get here, took me like.. three laps around the block to find the damn place." His cheeks flushed slightly at being caught, but then he chided himself for being embarrassed; Cadi knew full well about his geeky interests. They would not be here if she had not known. "Let's go in, shall we?" She jogged to the door and held it open, bowing her head and extending her other arm in a flourish. "After you, sir."
"You're too kind," Aaron replied with a laugh and walked in, the door jingling shut behind them. Both sets of eyes took in the Pen & Sword with a look akin to awe; Aaron's memory of comic stores had become rather convoluted over time, rose tinted with the nostalgia goggles of his 90s childhood, and usually when he had opted to spare comics a glance nowadays, it would be a brief pass through the graphic novel section at a major chain book store and nothing more. This store was larger than it had appeared from the shop front, looking full to bursting with collected volumes, toys, models, and various one-off issues. The old pony-tailed gentleman at the desk waved them in with a cheery welcome and Cadi grinned, stepping further into the store. Aaron followed with a bit of trepidation, unsure of where he should even start. They gravitated towards a large display of Funko figures, showing off various characters that were rather popular on today's television networks. While he still felt very behind and somewhat lost, he was eager to reconnect with his repressed interests and get properly up to speed - he had kept it quiet for far too long and if he was going to be a better dad (and husband, too, now that he had thought of it), it was time to shake those bad feelings and learn to be more open and honest about himself. There was nothing shameful about this; there were plenty of places to start, and he wanted to restart by visiting some old favorites.
"So hey, why are you comic shopping, anyway?" He raised both eyebrows as Cadi's eyes widened in delight, head turning to and fro to take it in. "Did you find a job yet?"
"Thanks for your concern, Dad," she pouted, setting a Sherlock Funko figure back on the stack. "I got some money for my birthday and Mom said to spend it on me so, here we are." She gestured to the wire shelves of new issue comics; he had to admire how skillfully she had dodged his question. "Mind if we scope out the manga section first?"
"'Manga'?" Aaron once again looked puzzled; it had been so long since he had actually stepped into a comic shop physically that the term did not sound in the least bit familiar. It had easily been a decade or more. "Yeah sure, I'll follow you." She was quick to lead and hustled to the back section of the store, just shy of the adult media that comic shops were want to carry, and leaned back when the approached the appropriately marked wall, hands on her hips to appraise the goods. "Ohh, this stuff." Back in his youth, the stuff that would have been in this section was much, much smaller, encompassing maybe a small bookshelf at most, while this one spanned the whole back wall as well as several other bookshelves. Cadi's head tilted back towards him, mirroring the confused look he wore earlier.
"You've never heard of manga before?"
"The anime comics, right?" Cadi groaned in response.
"Oh my god, Aaron."
"C'mon, chill, it's been a while since I've been in one of these place. Anyway forget that, gimme some recommendations, we're here to do business so let's do some business." He rubbed his hands together and turned his attention towards the shelf.
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Posted: Sat Oct 24, 2015 5:15 pm
The door to the comic book shop opened again, giving a chime as two individuals walked in - or more accurately, one walked and one floated. Amity trailed behind Connor, wings folded tight to avoid hitting anything and both ears and eyes perking up at the array of bright colors. Another wave was given by the ponytailed man as they approached the front counter.
"Hey there Connor! Here for the week's pull list?"
"You got it."
Leaning out from behind Ronan's friend Amity watched as the man sent another employee to the back, the individual returning a moment later with a small stack of comics and handing it over to Connor.
"Heeeeere you go!"
"Thanks," Connor said with a smile, taking the stack and placing it on the counter.
The pony tailed man began ringing the issues up, giving a side glance to Amity. "Just these today, or doing some browsing too?"
"Browsing," Connor said, giving the frei an affectionate pat on the shoulder. "This is Amity, watching her today for Ronan so I figured I might as well show her around."
"Oh really?" The man gave a sly smile as he bagged the last of the comics, accepting Connor's credit card with a quiet "Thank you" and sliding over the receipt a moment later for Connor to sign. "The elusive buddy himself. Think you might get him in here someday?"
Connor laughed. "That might take awhile. I'll fight battles I can win, thank you."
"Suit yourself," The cashier said, handing over the credit card and bag of comics with a grin. "Have fun browsing the store, and let me know if we've got a convert on our hands."
"Will do."
Amity looked back somewhat slack jawed as the two of them walked to another part of the store, turning to Connor a second later.
"You come and do this every week?"
"Well, it depends on if any of my comics came out, but pretty much."
"... wow."
She might not be a convert quite yet, but Amity's interest was definitely piqued.
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Friendly Conversationalist
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Posted: Sun Dec 06, 2015 11:47 am
"... The hell is this."
"What?" Cadi quirked her eyebrow and glanced up from the manga she was perusing - a long-running series for teen boys and an old favorite of hers from days gone by.
"This." Aaron held up a volume where two young girls in school uniforms (one in the male uniform blazer) were surrounded in a haze of lace and pink and flower petals, eyes wide and smiling, hands clasping for the other. "Look at this, what's wrong with their faces, they've got like one eye that's about to fall off." Cadi's lips pressed together and she tried to hold back a snort as Aaron squinted at the cover one more time, ever the critic, before putting it back. "And their legs; legs for days."
"Yeah that's probably... not your speed." Setting her own volume back on the shelf, she tapped her chin, scanning the wall. She gave a low exhale once she made a discovery and plucked a new book from the wall, handing it to her uncle figure. This one had a much more modern, bolder style than the one he had been holding before, decidedly more boyish but still looked entertaining; at least she had hoped so from the online reviews she had read. "Try this one." He accepted it without question, flipping through to the middle and one of his own eyebrows shooting up into his growing bangs at a two-page spread of the main character punching an adversary so hard he created a crater that looked to be miles across.
"Damn." He whistled. "Brutal."
"A bit, yeah." Cadi chuckled as he continued to leaf through it at random. "Maybe.. hm. Let's try some good ol' DC or Marvel. You got a preference?" He brightened up at the familiar mentions; Aaron easily recalled his time in comic shops before was spent pouring over superhero comics, being so young at the time. Most of his interest was driven by the cartoons he had grown up with in the early to mid-nineties, especially a certain Dark Knight, whose series he remembered very fondly.
"Batman." He rubbed his hands together, eliciting a low laugh from his niece. "Always Batman. I loved the 90s cartoon." Cadi, too, visibly brightened as she took the book he had been leafing through and set it back on the shelf.
"Bruce Timm Batman?" For the first time since they had walked into the store, he felt in the know at the familiar name, and he grinned.
"Bruce Timm Batman." Cadi clasped her two hands together, her delight apparently from the upturn of her lips.
"Let's see if we unearth some treasures in the back issues then. I've seen them floating around." There was little preamble as she scooted around him and weaved back through some of the shelves; she paused a moment to untangle the end of her peacoat from a stubborn table corner, but by that time Aaron had caught up and they were on their way again towards the front of the store. A couple of new faces had entered (Aaron distinctly remembered hearing the chime of the bell over the door) and were talking with the cashier and amongst each other; he caught sight of a few of the animal-like features on the girl but the man with her was obscuring most of her from view. "Over here, towards the side wall." Cadi had found the rows of back issues and was waving him over, already sifting through the 'B' file. Aaron glanced up towards the front, noting that conversation with the cashier had ceased, and favored the easier route in their quest.
"Hey shopkeep, y'got any Bruce Timm?" He grinned, glancing at the two he had been helping before as they approached closer to where he and Cadi were, and his heart gave a little jolt when he saw more of the girl - a Raevan! The ribbon trail was as clear as day, now that he was on this side of the cashier counter. "Oh hey, another Raevan! My wife's in the Lab program." Cadi paused at the mention, her fingers hovering over the collected back issues, her eyes sweeping over to whom Aaron was engaging. He came forward, his initial shyness about being in the Pen & Sword forgotten; he had not really met any Raevans on his own without prompting from his wife or a huge group gathering, and needless to say Aaron was excited about this opportunity. "Gambino is smaller than it looks sometimes, huh? Aaron Holmes, pleasure." He held his hand out to both of them in turn, all smiles, but he addressed his next question to Amity when he asked, "Is this your guardian?" Granted, he had only been to a few Lab get togethers, but he did not recognize the face at all. Cadi hung back a bit shyly, one arm rubbing the other, but she, too, had taken a step forward towards them.
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Posted: Wed Dec 16, 2015 4:44 pm
Of the things he had been expecting today, this had not been one of them.
Connor watched in growing internal horror as Amity turned in surprise to the new comers. Meeting people from the lab wasn't necessarily the problem. The problem was the assumption he knew, just knew was coming.
"Is this your guardian?".
... yep.
He gave an awkward cough. "Ah, um... no. I'm actually watching her today for my friend, Ronan." Ronan was the responsible one, dammit, not him.
Amity looked over to Connor in bewilderment. It wasn't just the fact that he'd interrupted the question - it was the rapidly rising look of embarrassment on his face. Needless to say, both were wildly out of character.
The look from Amity was enough to briefly snap Connor out of his daze at least, and he accepted the handshake from Aaron. "A-anyway, I'm Connor."
"Amity," the frei said, pumping Aaron's hand a bit more enthusiastically. It was at this point she got a good look at the girl standing behind him. Her ears twitched, taking in the girl's appearance, and she leaned to the side to address her directly.
"I like your hair!"
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Friendly Conversationalist
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Posted: Wed Dec 16, 2015 10:35 pm
"Oh geez." Aaron immediately felt the heat of embarrassment creep up his neck at Connor's obvious discomfort, but as the other man did his best to push past it, so did he, grinning once again when his handshake was returned. "Easy mistake, sorry dude." Ronan was not a familiar name to him either; perhaps that was something he should work on - familiarizing himself with the other faces at the Lab. This was a decent start, though, as both Raevan and friend introduced themselves. "Guess we're not the only folks feeling the draw of the comic shop today, huh Cadi?" At the sudden attention, Cadi started, her arms lowering to her sides to glance up at him, but Amity seemed to have other plans when she addressed the girl herself.
"O-oh, thank you," she stammered, her cheeks swelling with color at the sudden compliment as well as a smile creeping its way into her lips. "I like yours. And your ears? If you don't mind my saying." She chuckled, still a bundle of nerves but doing her best to edge herself out of it.
"Hey guys, not meaning to break up this happy meeting but were you still interested in the Bruce Timms?" The cashier leaned against the counter with his cheek in his palm, all smiles. "I got some in the back if you wanna wait."
"You bet, no worries, take your time, man," Aaron replied, eagerly. He seemed all too happy to get reacquainted with Batman again, especially the one he had grown up with. The cashier waved cheerfully and slipped past them, back towards where the duo had originally come from, and with the interruption finished, Aaron returned his attention to Connor and Amity. "So what are you guys up to today?" His eyes dropped to the bag in Connor's hands curiously. "Getting into some new stock?" Cadi leaned over to Amity, the smile from before still on her lips and she chuckled again.
"I'm trying to get him initiated anyway, this old man is behind the times," Cadi added in a low but not inaudible whisper, to which Aaron shot her a mock pout.
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Posted: Wed Jan 06, 2016 10:32 am
"It's all good," Connor said, the awkwardness of the situation draining away along with some of his embarrassment. A good part of this was due to Amity, who was now lightly scratching an ear before running her hand through her hair.
"Thank you too!" she said, looking between the new individuals with a megawatt smile.
The next question from Aaron at least was a little easier for Connor to answer. "I'm here for my pull list," he said, holding up his bag of new issues. "Not a ton this week but enough to make a trip for it." The 'enough for a trip' line was a bit of a white lie - even if he had only been picking up a single comic issue, Connor would have still been here today. He gave a soft snort and smiled at Cadi's side comment, Amity also giggling.
"Never to late to get into things," Connor said, looking over a Amity a moment later. "Or too early."
Amity had been following the conversation fairly easily, though there was one thing that was still bugging her.
"What's a... Bruce Timm?"
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Friendly Conversationalist
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Posted: Thu Jan 14, 2016 12:53 pm
"Sweet deal, anything good?" Aaron did not know what a pull list was off the top of his head, but there were enough contextual clues for him to figure it out, and he grinned at Connor as he asked for it. When the conversation progressed, Cadi finally edged closer to the group, standing at Aaron's side with both arms resting over her ribcage and wearing a tentative smile. She had approached half out of her lingering desire to be more included and half to get out of the cashier's way as he made for the back, seeking what they had come for. That, too, brought up another point, and Amity voiced her concern loud and clear for all to hear, and both Aaron and Cadi turned to her, eyebrows raised.
"Did you ever see the 90s Batman cartoon?" Cadi asked, still a bit surprised. Aaron, meanwhile, remembered that it was her first time encountering Raevans, and that despite appearance she likely was not aware that Amity had not been around during the 90s. He made to say something else, but Cadi rolled forward, a little more gently this time as though realizing that not everyone is as steeped in geek culture as she is. "He did the character designs and a lot of the writing on that show. He's the man behind Harley Quinn, and they did some connected comics to the series." It had been a while since he had seen Cadi so interested at any sort of function, and Aaron once again reigned in a response. His niece seemed to pause in thought before her eyes lit up. "How much d'you know of Batman, Amity?" At this, the man finally spoke up
"Probably less than I do, and I don't know a lot," Aaron laughed. Cadi nodded determinedly and moved closer to Amity, eyes still ablaze with excitement.
"C'mon, why don't we go scope out what they've got for Batman stuff? They gotta have the DVDs here, I always see them for sale super cheap and that's a great starting point!"
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Posted: Fri Feb 19, 2016 10:15 am
"Mostly just some of the basics," Connor said. "Captain America, Batman, the new Star Wars series, that sort of thing." There were also some new issues of Ms. Marvel and Spider-Gwen out, and while they weren't on his pull list (he could get them as trades if he wanted) he kept the series in mind as something to possibly show Amity.
Amity hesitated at the question about Batman. Is sounded interesting, it should be something interesting (since it had to do with bats, after all), but she was forced to give a somewhat halting reply.
"I... no. I don't know." Just the admission itself felt weird. By the way Cadi was looking at her Amity felt as if this was something she should know, and the gap in her knowledge became a sudden itch under her skin. Sure, she sometimes watched along if Kris or Maili were watching something, and she'd been introduced to the Magic School Bus as her very first books to learn to read (now well graduated), but overall Amity had been too distracted by the summer outdoors to pay much attention to different stories. In that instant, she became determined to fix that.
"Show me! I'm ready!" Amity's eyes had blazed up to match Cadi's enthusiasm, the frei clenching her fists in front of her chest.
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Friendly Conversationalist
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Posted: Fri Feb 19, 2016 10:15 pm
Aaron only had time to nod at Connor's list before Cadi had taken Amity's arm gently and guided her gently towards the side wall. "We should probably make sure they don't get into too much trouble," he joked to Connor before following in their wake. Cadi's enthusiasm was still present, bubbling just under the surface, but she had adopted a calm facade, as though she were taking a young mentor under her wing. This kindled a sense of familiarity in Aaron, remembering how easily she corralled her younger niece and nephew at Thankgiving and other prior family events.
"Alright so.. let's try to get you a primer of sorts." Cadi put her hands on her hips to study the wall of goods - action figures, plush toys, expensive anime resin figures, DVD sets, and other catch-all merchandise that did not fit into the poster or comic categories. Her eyes scanned the goods critically, narrowed, until her eyebrows lifted and she reached forward, plucking a DVD set from the wall. "Ah, here we go. Bruce Timm's 'Batman: The Animated Series'. This is the 90s Batman cartoon I was talking about." She flipped it over to check the price tag, and whistled appreciatively. "Nice, only $15. Not bad." She handed it over to Amity and pointed at the cover. "This is Batman. He's uh.. not really a superhero, more like a vigilante? He doesn't have superpowers, anyway. But this is the series I was talking about. This is the good Batman."
"There's a bad Batman?" Aaron offered. Cadi leveled a stare at him from around Amity's shoulder, which wrangled a deep laugh from his throat, before she returned her attention to the Raevan at her side.
"There are lots of Batman things. Some are better than others, but I think for starters, the animated series is the way to go. You get the most human Batman." She nodded sagely, patting the DVD cover. "He's got his own problems to deal with and he dislikes injustice, but he ain't brutal for no reason. None of that Frank Miller BS." She paused and added hastily to Amity, "Don't read anything by Frank Miller." Aaron laughed again and Cadi frowned. "I'm serious, he's awful."
"Opinionated, aren't you?" he asked through chuckles then looked to Connor apologetically. "If she's recommending 90s Batman though, I can't complain too much." If there was anything he had held on to in terms of geekdom, it was that.
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Posted: Fri Mar 18, 2016 6:15 pm
Connor followed Aaron and the two girls, agreeing with the assessment of needing to keep them out of trouble. He'd heard too many stories of Amity going her own way, and he wanted to keep up his good record for the day.
The frei in question was already listening intently to Cadi's guiding words, holding the season dvd set and trying her best to absorb the advice she was being given. Right now she didn't have the context to make sense of most of it, but that would come with time. The mention of a "Frank Miller" though caused Connor hiss a breath out between his teeth, and Amity looked over with raised eyebrows.
"I got an issue of All Star Batman and Robin once in my pull list." He grimaced at the memory. "I only got it once." Connor had heard of a reviewer referring to "Batman" in that series as Steve with how out of character things were. He had to agree with the sentiment. Amity's eyebrows continued to climb, but Connor shook his head. "Trust me, you're better not knowing." The Long Halloween and Dark Victory could be something that he could show her someday, but that could wait until she was older.
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Friendly Conversationalist
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Posted: Sat Mar 19, 2016 1:46 pm
Aaron lifted his brows at the mention of Frank Miller but at the hiss from Connor next to him, he blinked, momentarily taken aback. Cadi nodded emphatically to Connor's assessment and while Aaron was as lost as Amity when it came to this guy, it could not have been good if both of the more knowledgable connoisseurs amongst them disliked him. "I'll take your word for it," he said to Connor before he lobbed a grin at his niece, who seemed to still be steaming about the very idea of Frank Miller.
"I'm so tired of people praising his grimdark bullshit --" Cadi grumbled loudly before clapping a hand over her mouth and glancing at Amity apologetically. "-- Sorry, 'junk'. But y'know, you can have a well-rounded character without making it super gritty and dark and depressing and violent. And this balances the line very nicely." She patted the DVD set in Amity's hands a second time with a sage nod. "Let me know how you like it, we can go from there with Batman. Otherwise... hm." She tapped her chin, gaze taking in the room and the current series that were out. "So there's Batman. Maybe some super heroines? I've been loving Ms. Marvel." And once again she was on the move towards the Marvel side of the wall, hand tucked gently around the crook of Amity's arm as she led her to the new releases. A proud teenage girl stood ready underneath the title logo of Ms. Marvel from the issue she plucked and handed to Amity. "She's this comic and gaming geek who gets the chance to be a superhero, and gets to meet all her favorite heroes. It's really great."
Aaron chuckled, somewhat surprised. When it came to family gatherings, Cadi was withdrawn, sticking to her niece and nephew and their 3DS systems, the occasional acerbic comment or observation and nothing more. Her enthusiasm came through clearly with them but with him and the rest of the family, she kept to herself. But now she was all smiles and excitement as she guided Amity around.
"Oh! Manga would be fun too," she noted with a nod towards the back of the store and started to lead Amity in that direction.
"Legs for days!" Aaron called as he followed after them, and he heard the girl snort.
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Posted: Sun Mar 27, 2016 6:56 pm
Amity eagerly began to flip through the issue of Ms Marvel that she'd been handed, dvd case now held between her side and her arm, but before she'd gotten more than a couple pages in Connor plucked the issue from her hands. She stared at him at the sudden betrayal. He just shook his head, depositing the issue back on the wall.
"Don't be going and spoiling yourself, okay? We can pick up a trade in a moment."
The word trade in this context, like many of the things talked about today already, flew over Amity's head. "Spoiling" didn't make sense either. But Connor's gaze told her that he wasn't going to budge so Amity settled for a puff cheeked pout, following Cadi with the dvd set clutched against her chest.
The selection they came to next was different from the comics they'd looked at already, not as tall or wide but much thicker and almost shaped more like the dvd set she was carrying. And the binding almost looked to be... backwards? She looked over to Cadi, waiting for some sort of explanation.
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Friendly Conversationalist
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Posted: Thu Mar 31, 2016 3:06 pm
Cadi laughed uneasily and held her hands up once the issues was plucked from Amity's hands. Her enthusiasm had gotten the better of her and she had picked one of the front-facing issues. "Sorry, wasn't thinking," she apologized with a sheepish smile, taking a moment before they moved fully towards the manga to leaf through the issues on the shelf. "He's right, though, looks like they don't have issue one in.. maybe they've got the first graphic novel? Think I read that that came out already." She mumbled half to herself and half to Amity as she guided her back, thinking aloud. Ms. Marvel was an unfamiliar name to Aaron and he chanced a glance at the issues as they moved towards the back with them. He happened to catch Amity's confused stare and could not supress the chuckle that rose in his throat.
"Yeah, me too," he told the bat Frei with a grin. "I don't really get this stuff." Cadi frowned over her shoulder at him and tossed her head back proudly, putting a sympathetic hand on Amity's shoulder.
"I used to love these when I was a kid," she started, fingers flicking over the spines. She was fairly certain that Connor was not intimate enough with some of these series that there would be a repeat of what had happened just moments before, but it was a good reminder, and she hovered over volumes clearly marked as the first. "They're comics from Japan and they cover all the bases for content, pretty much. Action, superpowers, horror, sci-fi, history stuff sometimes, romance if that's your thing." She scrunched her nose at the mention of the last one but still held her smile - clearly not a favorite of hers. She paused decisively and picked up a thinner volume from among the omnibuses, showing a young man with slicked back black hair and a cocky expression, flicking through it with a nostalgic sigh. "I loved this one, supernatural action adventure with some fun characters. What kinds of things do you think you might like?" As she looked up at Amity at last, she noted the bat's apparent confusion and laughed. "Aw dang, I'm sorry, I was going too fast wasn't I?" Her cheeks went rosy. "I have the worst nostalgia goggles. Let's see, uhm.." She snatched another volume off the shelf, this one with a spiky-haired blonde kid, and held the volume out to Amity and scooted closer to show her properly. "You gotta read it backwards, weird I know, but that's how they print their books in Japan." She turned to a page towards the beginning of the book where there was a full layout of panels. "You also have to read the panels right to left, kinda hard to get used to at first but it does get easier, trust me." Her face was still red from her overenthusiasm a beat before; Aaron almost felt sorry for her as he saw the self-consciousness growing in her eyes.
"Maybe just start her out on one so you don't overwhelm her," he suggested gently, looking to Connor next to him with a grin. "'Cause it already sounds like she's gonna have a lot of choices."
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Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2016 10:32 am
"There's three out already, actually," Connor said, in response to Cadi's wondering about possible Ms. Marvel graphic novels. "It's a pretty good amount to start with." Once they got to the manga, however, his knowledge base dried up rapidly. He knew some basics, but that was it. Connor looked over to Aaron, hearing his little disclaimer to the frei and having to agree. "I'm right there with you."
Amity watched as Cadi explained the reading format to her. A bit different for her, but not something that she couldn't get the hang of if she worked at it. Holding one cover of the manga in her free hand as Cadi held the other she took a shot a reading the page. Things didn't make much sense at first, the word bubbles constantly ending up out of order, but after a few moments she'd made her way through. Not bad.
"Do you... know some good action things?" Like so many of the other things today Amity didn't know what genres she would like or dislike yet, but out of the list she'd been given that sounded the most appealing.
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Friendly Conversationalist
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Posted: Fri Apr 29, 2016 1:28 pm
Cadi appeared to be taking Aaron's admonishion of "don't overwhelm her" to heart, her face betraying some of her self-consciousness but not dampening her enthusiasm entirely. She glanced back at the shelf at Amity's suggestion and relieved her of the Naruto volume she had used to show her how to read the pages, eyes zeroing back in on her old favorite series. She picked up the volume she had been looking at fondly just a moment before and passed it over to Amity with a smile.
"Think you'll find this right up your alley. It's called Yu Yu Hakusho - it's got comedy, action, the works. It's an old favorite of mine." She put her hand on the cover and then turned to peruse the shelf one more time, pausing in thought, and then picking up the same volume she had just given Amity for herself. After that, it was back to the task at hand and she continued browsing, trying to find another suggestion. The frei had not seemed particularly engaged by Naruto (and if she were honest, Cadi had to admit that a very long-running series might be much for Amity's first jump into manga), perhaps something a little more accessible was in order, instead. She scanned the shelf, skimming past the romance and very girly titles littered throughout, the plastic-wrapped volumes denoted for the 16+ crowd, further into the alphabetized novels - and then she paused, glancing back up towards the 'A' section. "Here we go!" A thick omnibus volume stood out amongst its taller neighbors and she plucked it from the shelf carefully. The artwork was certainly dated, but the robotic main character posed with a smile on the cover brought back memories of watching the cartoon counterpart early in the morning. "Astro Boy. I haven't read the comic version but I loved the show when I was little. I think you'll like it too." An action series with pathos, written for younger and casual viewers in mind - a perfect intro to manga, Cadi thought.
"You might want to watch the wallet, there, kid," Aaron reminded with a chuckle.
"Oh!" Her cheeks reddened. "Yeah I guess that's true.. just these two for now then. With Batman there and maybe Ms. Marvel's first graphic novel, I think you'll have plenty to occupy you." She grinned apologetically at the two guys, aiming it at Connor in particular - she had a feeling that he was the one keeping hold of Amity's spending money.
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