Andy sighed as she stepped into the front entryway, shutting the door behind her. She was gradually readjusting to a normal work schedule, but it was a bit draining at times; she hoped she wouldn't be too zonked-out tomorrow, when she was supposed to officially start the job. And there had been that thing with...what was his name, Greg?
Sue met her as she came inside. "Hi, honey," he said, taking her in his arms. "How'd it go?"
Andy hugged him back, then shrugged. "...Uh, okay," she said, putting on a smile. Sue looked her up and down. "Your ears don't lie, you know," he said. "Did something happen?"
The rabbit-woman sighed. "It was nothing much, just this...this guy kept bugging me. Nothing major, but I tried to steer him away from...from checking me out and back to work, and the message just was not getting through." She looked up at her husband. "What are you supposed to do with someone like that?" she asked.
Susan smiled sadly. "Welcome to one of the more annoying bits about being a woman," he said. "Sometimes there really isn't much you can do and still be subtle or polite about it. Does he know you're married?"
Andy frowned, crossing her arms under her breasts. "He oughta, I flashed my ring where he could see it something like half a dozen times."
"But you never told him?"
She sighed. "Well, not directly. I mean, I'm trying not to come off like a stick-in-the-mud, some of it was just the kind of banter you get in a workplace, but he just wouldn't let up. If he got any of the hints, he was ignoring them..."
"Well, it's probably time for the direct approach, if it comes up again," the naga-man said. "Some guys just don't get hints, especially when they don't want to hear them. Remember, time was you had to explain to me that you couldn't just read my mind..."
Andy frowned. "Well, yeah, but that was...I mean, I shouldn't have to tell him, he just shouldn't be doing it! It's...I dunno, maybe it's a guy thing, Sue, but you just don't do that, keep bugging a guy when he clearly..." She trailed off, realizing the flaw there. "...not unless you're trying to pick a fight or something," she finished, chagrined.
Sue nodded. "But you're not a guy anymore, are you?" he said. "You're a lovely woman in her prime years, who for all he knows is available. Not that that excuses tactless behavior, but let's be fair here. You're in a different world of social dynamics now, hon."
"But...it just..." Andy groaned to herself, face planted in her hand. "...it's not always like this, is it?" she asked after a moment, looking back up at her husband with a bit of a pleading expression.
Sue hugged her. "Of course not. Plenty of guys know how to pick up nonverbal cues better than that, and/or don't have their head wedged too far where the sun don't shine to recognize them. But...part of life is having to deal with the obnoxious outliers." He smiled. "And for what it's worth, I do think you made the right call trying to start subtle. Better than making a big deal out of everything right off the bat, right?"
Andy nodded, nuzzling up against him. So many things she still had to learn about all this...if it weren't for him, she didn't know what she'd do.
Lucas was in a bit of a daze as she tried to process what she'd just heard. It's what changed the Sun...this whole thing, this whole madcap topsy-turvy world that she and the entire rest of the planet had been living in for the last two months...all of it was the result of human action. Human action magnified through a powerful elemental force of magic, granted, but still...all this, going down right here in some place that was just halfway to even being a city, because of one person...yikes. And...and that meant that part of the fate of the world was in the hands of...of some girl from the midwest US. Some teenager. Who was this kid? What was she like? (Cripes, what was I like at that age? Lucas thought.) Why had she done it? What did she intend to do about it? How did she feel about it? ...how did Lucas feel about it?
To be perfectly honest, she wasn't really sure. She knew she liked her change - she'd gotten exactly what she'd asked for, and the aspects she hadn't specifically requested were pretty kickass as well. Not to mention that it'd given her a leg up into discovering a whole world beyond the world - and as much trouble as she'd nearly caused in her initial misadventure with it, she was finding out some truly amazing things about gods, humans, and the universe as a whole...
...on the other hand, for the thing that changed the Sun to be in the hands of one person...cripes, could anybody be trusted with that much power? What if it went to her head? What if she tried to abuse it, turned into a tyrant, and Lucas had to stop her with-
Oh. Right. There was that whole Lucas-was-also-in-charge-of-one-of-these-things thing. Not that she hadn't struggled with this very issue, but...she was learning when and how she should and shouldn't apply her power, and whatever she'd been tempted to do, she hadn't actually been corrupted, thus far. (Well, okay, she had given in to a few small self-gratifying urges, but that was hardly the same thing as serious megalomania.) On the other hand, she was an adult - maybe not exactly as mature as someone her age could be expected to be, but no middle-aged overgrown frat boy, either, and certainly not caught up in the emotional rollercoaster that was adolescence. A teenage girl...
...argh, this was all speculation. She didn't know anything about this kid other than that she existed. Haru seemed okay with the idea, at least, but she didn't really know anything about Haru, either, aside from the fact that apparently she could see more than just immediate physical realities. She needed to meet Jon, get to know her, before presuming to pass judgement on her. And...somewhere out there, there were probably other-
Her thoughts were interrupted when the phone rang. She looked around. The centauress doctor had stepped out to check on something just before Haru had revealed her big secret, and Haru herself appeared to have fallen asleep. Lucas picked up the phone. "Hello?"
"Hello," came the voice of a young woman. Behind it Lucas could hear the rough warbling of air passing a crappy cell-phone mic, and ambient noises that suggested she was walking down a city street. "You need to come to the pizza place at 4th and Elm, right away."
Lucas blinked. "Uh, what?" The hell kind of opening line was that? And who was this, anyway...?
"Pizza place. 4th and Elm," the girl repeated. "I think it's called Gary's. I can't explain; you know more about why this is important and how important it is than I do. Just be there, please."
Lucas frowned. "Look, I don't make a habit of just doing what random strangers-"
"GET MOVING!" the girl snapped. There was something about the quality of the voice that gave the angel pause; she halfway felt like she was going to do it regardless of whether she wanted to or not, and glanced at her feet suspiciously. There was a brief pause. "Sorry," the caller said. "This really is important. I gotta go." Then she hung up.
Lucas stared at the phone. "Huh," she muttered. "That was weird."
Tiffany stowed her cell phone back in her purse and shook her head in bewilderment. Her horn gave off the same gentle radiance that the lines on her skin did; in the light of the early evening, it was only just visible, giving the thing a silvery look. It was true; she didn't know exactly what was going on here. She didn't even know who it was she'd talked to. But she knew what needed to be done, and that it was important. She'd known it since she first discovered this...this form of insight, or foresight, or whatever it was, earlier this week. It wasn't that she could see the future, or anything, it was...it was more like...knowing the way. Seeing the road ahead. Little bits of it, anyway. She'd called the room she'd known to call; now for the other person...
Adam had been all over the city this afternoon looking for it. It's true by definition that "it's always in the last place you look," but she thought that searches like this were probably why that got to be a saying despite its obviousness. It really didn't seem that unreasonable to her to expect that more stores would have a mailman's satchel - the low-slung kind with the long strap - but none of the places out in the big-box-store district had had one, and she'd gone to quite a few smaller shops with no luck, either. She was just glad she'd sprung for the bus pass after her change had left her unable to drive her car.
Which was basically why she'd wanted the thing to begin with. It wasn't at all convenient to not be able to run any errands that required her to carry things while she was out, when the only thing stopping her was her lack of hands. She could cup light objects with her wingtips, if she had to, but they simply weren't designed for carrying weight - even though her overall upper-body strength was deceptively high, considering that she was built to keep her own weight airborne. She couldn't use normal grocery bags, either - she had to stick her wingtip too far into the handles to get it past the pinions and onto the bone, and if she tried to fly while clutching them in her talons, it left her weighted off-balance at the back.
Hence, the satchel. It hung low enough that she could get at things with one talon without having to set it down, though that took some doing, and it kept the weight on her shoulders rather than further down the wing. And if she kept the satchel on one side of her body and the strap around the opposite shoulder, crossing her torso, then when she flew, it would hang dead-center beneath her, the weight spread across her whole back, and not affect her balance nearly as much. She smiled, pleased with herself.
She was on her way to the bus stop, idly contemplating just flying home, when a strange girl approached her. She was in her late teens, pale-skinned and white-haired, dressed in flowing white-and-gold robes. What really drew the eye, though, was the gently-spiraled horn that grew from her forehead. So this was, what, a unicorn-girl? No, that didn't seem to be the right name; she didn't seem to have any equine features. Adam couldn't think of what if any name would be more appropriate - anyway, the girl was speaking.
"I need you to come with me," she said. "There's somewhere you need to be. It's very important."
Adam stared at her. "Uh, who are you?" she asked.
The girl sighed. "My name's Tiffany. How's that even relevant?"
The harpy frowned. "Well...I mean, you have to admit, that's a strange way to start a conversation. Where do you want me to go, and why?"
Tiffany shrugged. "'Where' is the pizza place on 4th and Elm. Why...I can't tell you," she said. "I would if I could, but I don't know why. You know more about it than I do. Just...trust me, okay? It's important, really."
Adam tried to figure this out. She seemed sincere, but she was talking nonsense. Adam needed to be at some pizza place for something that she knew about but the girl who was telling her to be there didn't? How did that make sense? "Look," she said, "I'm sorry, I really gotta-"
Tiffany huffed. "Just come, okay? Please?" Why did it have to be so hard to get anybody to listen to her? But the harpy-woman seemed to be a little more attentive...
Adam wasn't exactly sure why, but something in the girl's voice sounded...convincing. She was obviously sincere, but more than that...she sounded like she might actually know what she was talking about...
As Jon and Tim were making their way towards nowhere in particular, there was the sound of gastric rumbling. The dark elf looked a little embarassed. "Um," he said, "we should probably get a bite to eat, before we do anything else..."
Jon nodded. "Yeah, it is kinda getting on towards suppertime. Any ideas?"
Tim shook his head. "Nothing in particular. We just did the Chinese place the other night. You?"
The slug-girl shrugged. "We're not too far from Gary's Pizza. They're pretty good."
The drow-boy smiled. "Sure, sounds great."
