Welcome to Gaia! ::

The last bell of the day run through the empty halls of the Academy, signalling that classes had seized and the students were free to go home. Doors burst open in the freshling corridor one right after another as the young ones eagerly burst from their classrooms to head back to their families or quiet dorm rooms. Joselyn was one of the few who wasn't particularly in a rush, neatly packing away her things at her desk as a few of her classmates zoomed past her.

She always took her time at the end of the day, organizing and re-organizing her book bag as many times as it took for the class to empty out entirely. She liked to give all the other kids a head start on their respective ways home. Joselyn was happy to do so if it meant avoiding anymore name calling and teasing.

Shark mouth. Sharp tooth. Split jaw. These were just some of the names she got called thanks to her mutation.

Whomever their biological parents had been, it irked Joselyn to no end that they would be so idiotic as to risk having a child during October. Not only was it reckless and dangerous. Joselyn had been one of the 'lucky ones'. All children born during the Cursed Time either had deformities or were stillborn. Why would somebody ever risk that ... ? Go to all the effort and spend all that energy and exhaust themselves just to ruin their child's life by bestowing upon them ghastly marks that showcased to the world their curse, or to have your child die? It seemed cruel and uncalled for.

While she could be as angry as she wanted towards her unknown parents, and blame them for the awful bullying she had to endure, Joselyn could never blame Burvia for doing the exact same thing.

Burvia had risked the life of her child, and risked suffering heartbreak to give Joselyn a sibling. Her sister Gale had been lucky ... she was born during the Cursed Time as well, but had gotten off easy. Her mutations were small and passible. She had purple pupils and slit ones, similar to Joselyn. But the rest of Galexis had been beautiful and untouched by the curse, dissimilar to Joselyn.

It seemed hypocritical to Joselyn to blame her real parents for causing her unhappiness, and yet feel no anger towards Burvia for recreating the same scenario in her own child. It was why Joselyn never talked about it. She knew how it would sound if she ever said it aloud, and yet, here she was. Thinking about it and mulling it over in her head like it was all she ever was left to think about.

The mean comments and the awful pranks were just too much to deal with on a constant basis. Joselyn had become alienated from her own peers. Whenever a new student would join the class, she would have fleeting moments of hope, as if seeing a light at the end of the tunnel. Jose learned the hard way never to approach anyone new with a face like hers ... it always ended badly.

Sighing gently, Joselyn had maxed out on the ways she could fiddle with the things inside her bag and slowly placed her feet on the floor, sliding out of her chair and grabbing her bag off the desk. She supposed it was time to go home ... she had dawdled long enough, and if she stayed too much longer she might risk missing the carpool home with her siblings.

Joselyn sluggishly made her way down the aisle, eyes downcast so as to avoid talking to the teacher as she passed. However, something caught her attention in her peripheral. Joselyn lifted her head instinctually, surprised by the fact it seemed there was another student still left behind in the class. At first, she pondered why they weren't moving, and why they just seemed to be sitting there with a sad expression on their face. Then, Joselyn quietly wondered if they had been bullied too.

"Uhm ... " Joselyn opened her mouth to say something, then flinched, having forgotten she had left her mouth exposed and promptly lifted the neck of her sweater up over her lower face to cover up the gash of a mouth across her face. Trying again, her voice now muffled from the fabric, Joselyn spoke up a bit more nervously. "Uhm ... hello."

Maybe the kid was alright. But if they weren't, and they were just like Jose -- having a bad experience at school and feeling miserable because of it -- then she wouldn't be able to live with herself knowing she had just ignored someone's feelings. If he was fine and just zoned out, then Joselyn knew she could carry on her way before her mutation got her in trouble again.

Joselyn observed the other freshling in silence, reviewing their movements and reactions over in their head. They seemed docile enough. And an apology? For nothing? This child seemed unhappy. Joselyn recognized the signs the child was putting off as her own symptoms of depression.

Still pinching her sweater between her bone claws, Joselyn kept her mouth closed until the child was to their feet, standing before them, her posture straightening out as they introduced themselves.

"Joselyn." The litch offered in return. She would have extended a hand to shake hands like the adults did, but both hands were rather occupied keeping her mouth out of sight.

"Are you alright? You look down ... did something happen ... ?" she tried to ask as gently as she new how to, but despite all the sensitivities Joselyn had developed, she herself wasn't exactly good at choosing her words gingerly, though she did make an effort.

"Hmnf." was Joselyn's first response, her eyes cast down again as she absorbed his first words thoughtfully.

"I'm lost too ... " was what came out first, but then the freshling continued and clarified, and Joselyn couldn't help but to flush behind her sweater collar at her own mistake. /Ah/. Thoth meant they didn't have parents. How stupid of her. She should have known. But was not having parents really big of a deal? Tch. Joselyn should have known the answer to that. Up until a few years ago she was parentless herself. She had been awoken by incompetent parents and then dumped on the front stoop of the orphanage to be raised by caretakers once they saw her garish disfigurement. The orphanage had treated her the same as the academy did now. But at least something good came from her time at the orphanage -- Burvia had applied for adoption, met her, and decided to choose her. She couldn't exactly say she was unwanted.

"Ah." was all she managed to say. For a long while, she remained silent, then tried her best to relate. "Uh. I kinda get that ... at least I used to before my own circumstances changed. I know you're in the academy now which means you can't exactly get adopted unless someone notices you enough to specifically pick you and add you to their family, but. At least you can always start a family of your own when you get older, right? You don't have to stay lost forever."

Joselyn's hands slipped a little as she got more comfortable, her grip loosening on her sweater, but not enough to reveal her mouth.

"Oh." Jose said a touch flatly. "Then you're not really alone; you're on an important quest to find them. Like saving the princess in a video game, or something." Joselyn shrugged easily. "It's all about perspective, right?"

Joselyn cleared her throat at his questioning, shifting a little uncomfortably. Yup. She had lingered too long again, and the questions were starting to roll in. She could have just ignored him and walked away then and there, but Joselyn had better sense than to do that to someone who clearly wasn't in a good headspace.

"Nah." she said a bit quietly. "I like to wait until everyone is out of the class, or apparently nearly everyone, until I head out. It's just better that way."

"No. I like my family; they accepted me after my first one rejected me. I respect them. It's the students I have a problem with. They don't like me and I try to avoid them." Joselyn shrugged as-a-matter-of-factly. She hadn't made a single friend since coming to the academy. Her siblings, however, had made friends effortlessly. Even her newest siblings had made connections on day one of school.

"Were they adopted from the orphanage? " she asked curiously. That would kinda suck being old enough to see your siblings get scooped up, but she found it a little odd. They tried their best to keep siblings together once they hit the orphanage. Joselyn had a hard time believing anyone would be so cruel as to split siblings up once they'd already basically imprinted on one another. Then again, if the kids at the Academy were a testament to how cruel people could be, she couldn't exactly say anything.

"How ... young were you exactly? And that must have been rough. To be raised with them and then just separated like that ... the orphanage frowns upon separating siblings if they can help it. The parents of your siblings must have been jerks to take them away and not take you too." Joselyn shook her head. That seemed so unkind and unfair.

Soon, Joselyn found herself shrugging, though. She had barely noticed any real change in Thoth's expression. They seemed incapable of looking anything different than 'sad'. "I understand why I'm alone, even if it's not a nice feeling. I guess if I was normal I'd probably think the same way they do about me too."

Joselyn ground her sharp teeth together beneath her sweater. Should she tell Thoth? She had already gotten this deep in to conversation with the freshling. Was there really any point in trying to back out now?

"I'm a mutant." She blurted without emotion, having gone numb on the topic whenever she spoke about it with people. It was a defense mechanism. "I was born to a litch family -- already cursed with rot. They were stupid and tried to wake my stone during the Cursed Time. They succeeded. I was born disfigured and they hated how I looked. They couldn't believe they had made something so hideous and so they dumped me off at the orphanage in a basket in the snow to be found by the caretakers the next morning. I nearly froze to death over night, or so I was told."

Joselyn shrugged yet again, this time to try and make herself believe it was no big deal. If she acted nonchalantly about the ordeal, maybe she'd feel like it didn't matter.