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 Posted: Sat Jul 29, 2006 2:18 pm
"Are you sure you want this many?"
"Yes, ma'am." Struggling to keep the mountain of books balanced in one hand, Karoko slid her library card on the desk with the other. The old woman examined it, entered some information into the computer, then handed it back to her.
How many books there were, one might wonder enough to count. The real question was how she was managing to hold them all, much less push the door open and walk outside with them.
Crash!
The skateboarder road right into her, sending the multiple books and both persons toppling to the ground. Karoko was the first to recover with a small gasp, followed by a sigh of relief with the discovery all the books seemed alright.
One by one, she stacked them up, then stood and held her hand out to the boy. "Sorry..."
"You better be!" the boy hissed, smacking her hand away. He got to his feet just as two more came to a stop. None of them looked more than a year older than her at most, but they were certainly angrier.
Karoko's ears lowered. "I didn't mean--"
"You talk too much!" the same one snapped at her, grabbing the front of her shirt and tugging her forward. "You trying to start something?"
"What? No! I just--" Well, damn. This was why she didn't go outside without Noharu...
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Posted: Sat Jul 29, 2006 2:31 pm
Odd how coincidences can happen, really. On this same day, Sylvest was scooted out of his house to "go to the library or something" while his mother did whatever she was to do (most of it involved trying to get all of the extra food he had made out of the house before it spoiled, but he doesn't know that). So, with his usual six-pack of bottled water cradled in one of his many arms and a library card unceremoniously stuffed in his back pocket, the octopus lad had set out to hit the books.
Of course, the first thing he sees upon cresting the final hill to the library is said books hitting the ground. Then he sees Karoko for the first time in ages, and then a bunch of not-abnormal kids who do not look very nice at all. Despite his low endurance out of water- and doubly so in this summer weather- he rushes up to investigate.
And the kid might have been short when he had first become a child, but now he's at least a good couple of inches taller than the tallest kid in the group of bullies, albeit gangly as well.
But as it is, even though he has size and limb advantage, Sylvest is still, well, Sylvest. So instead of doing anything even remotely heroic, his octopus arms curl upon themselves and somehow he manages to call out, "Hey, y-you should leave that girl alone!"
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Posted: Sat Jul 29, 2006 2:44 pm
"Slyvest?" Karoko blurted out questioningly. How long had it been since she'd seen him? ...Actually, she hadn't really seen any other kid outside her family she knew in a while, much less a fellow Eden.
"Ewww! Look it at!" one of the other two piped up.
"Hey!" the bat girl cut in. "You can't say that to him!" In return, the grip on her shirt tightened, as did the fist of the 'leader'.
"He can't, can he? You shouldn't interupt him that way!"
The bell above the door to the building beside them rang as the old woman pushed it opened and peeked outside. The scene made her chubby face red with anger, and she waved her hand demandingly. "Shoo, you holagins! Shoo!"
The boy released Karoko, and with each of them mumbled some rather...color things, the three left.
Karoko glared at them and brushed herself off. "Jeesh, how rude!"
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Posted: Sat Jul 29, 2006 2:54 pm
This is a crisis situation, Karoko could be clocked, Sylvest could have his arms tied in knots, and what does the kid do when she recognizes him? He blushes and waves with a vacant grin. He hadn't noticed it before- well, he did, but not in the same way- but now he realizes that Karoko is a girl. With nice black hair, and pretty blue eyes, and... well, let's move on.
He opens his mouth to try and retort against the other kid's disgusted comment, but is stopped when Karoko does it before him. He's been defended! By a pretty girl! Oh, the joy! The rapture of it all!
They both got out of the situation unscathed in any case, so there's no harm done. The octopus lad is stuck there with the same dumb clearly-not-with-the-rest-of-the-world expression, though, and it takes Karoko's retort to get him out of that that. He jerks a bit in surprise, and replies, "Uhh, y-yeah. They're rude, alright."
And boy oh boy, does the bat girl have a lot of books. And only two arms to carry them with! No wonder she dropped them all even though it was obviously the skateboarding kid's doing! Sylvest takes a look at them, looks at Karoko, and offers, "You, uhh... you want some help with those?
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Posted: Sat Jul 29, 2006 3:09 pm
"Huh?" It was more of a questioning noise than an actual word. It took her an unusual amount of time (or least what most would consider such) to realize he what he was offering. "Oh! That'd be great, thank you." Offering a cheerful smile, she gathered five of the ten books and left the rest for him.
"I probably shouldn't have gotten so many at once," she admitted, partially to herself, and nudged the door open with her foot. Who had she thought she was kidding trying to take all these home alone? "So how have you been?"
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Posted: Sun Jul 30, 2006 6:50 pm
For that unusually long period of time, Sylvest was afraid that Karoko was ignoring him, or maybe she didn't like him or wanted to him go away. The boneless arms protruding from his back droop and become dark and dull in hue, perfectly expressing the sinking feeling he has. They brighten and lift back up as the bat girl obliges his offer, along with his face reddening again and his dumb grin returning.
"Yeah, okay!" he says, his voice sliding a little too much in a wave of awkwardness. He takes up his half of the stack in two of his arms, wrapping around them tight and using as much power in their suckers as he think they can manage- there's very little risk of the boy dropping them, to be sure.
"You can-nnnever have enough books!" he replies with a tone of incredulity, having been raised by a hopelessly bookish mother figure. "S'what my mom says, anyway." Scratching the back of his head with a hand in a typical shy-boyish manner, he says, "Oh, uhhm, I... I've been good, I guess! What, uh, how about you?"
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Posted: Sun Jul 30, 2006 9:23 pm
While intelligent enough to change the garage into a 'lab', there were some areas Karoko lacked common sense. Most of them were social ones, obvious when she didn't have the slightest clue why those...things suddenly got darker. What were those, anyway? It'd be rude to ask, wouldn't it?
"That's true," she said in agreement, walking to one of the tables and setting the books down. "Your mom is pretty smart." She couldn't say she'd change Noharu, but...
The only thing she ever said like that was: 'There's no problem you can't solve by punching someone in the face.'
"I've been alright," answered the girl cheerfully.
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Posted: Mon Jul 31, 2006 7:29 am
Social awkwardness, you say? Well, it looks we have a two-for-one special here! It's not as if Sylvest is as shy as he once was, but he is still quite ungainly in social situations. He doesn't seem to notice Karoko trying to figure out what his cephalopodic arms are supposed to be, at any rate.
"She's cool, I guess. For a mom." the child grins awkwardly, boasting the typical relationship 10-something-year-old boys seem to have with their mothers.
And oh, how the two could relate on some level if the conversation would get to such a point! Whilst Karoko has the garage as her makeshift lab, Sylvest has the kitchen in his own house as... well... his own kitchen. There's enough prepared food in it to feed a hotel at any rate, and he can't seem to stop.
"Alright is good!" he says, smiling with a slightly tilted head for a couple of seconds while trying to think of anything that could strike up a conversation. He remembers her tinkering with a clock when they last met... "Uhhh... are you still fixing clocks?"
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