worth an oat

[alicornucopia]

In this soup kitchen sits a nun in partial habit, sipping water and frowning at a desk. It is very irregular for adults who aren't volunteering to be at the soup kitchen. It is very irregular for expensive electronics to be in the soup kitchen. The volunteers do seem to know her; they call her "Carlotta".

Comments

[alicornucopia]

"I'm flying!" crows Bella. She lands on her toes and pushes off again with a twist. Somebody bats at her as she goes by and she starts working on how to correct midair; she bounces past that launchie again to provoke more opportunities.

[pythbox]

With only the air to push against, midair course corrections are a severely limited art. Bella is the least severely limited of all of them, of course.

Sindri and Oat don't even bother trying to cross the room. They're content to slide along this wall from handhold to handhold, occasionally rescuing each other from bare spots.

[alicornucopia]

"Don't you want to fly?" Bella asks, clinging near them with windblown hair and a grin. "You probably can't fly like me but you could do a little."

[pythbox]

"I'm too small to maneuver effectively in this room," says Oat.

"I don't have it quite that bad, but the way Oat flies is good enough for me," says Sindri.

[alicornucopia]

"Bah," says Bella, and she tumbles away again. Someone holds out an arm to her and she catches his hand and they go spinning interestingly.

[pythbox]

Oat and Sindri continue to help each other navigate a system that wasn't really designed with them in mind.

[alicornucopia]

"You'll grow," she points out next time she's in their corner of the room, "and you won't have any practice. I'll fetch you if you get stuck floating?"

[pythbox]

"At projected rates, by the time I'm tall enough to reliably reach two handholds at once, I will have graduated," says Oat. Sindri snorts.

[alicornucopia]

"So learn to fly with one at a time," says Bella. She demonstrates.

[pythbox]

"Why do you want me to?" says Oat.

[alicornucopia]

"It's fun!"

[pythbox]

"It looks it!" says Sindri.

"I don't want to," says Oat.

[alicornucopia]

"Also we're supposed to and the grownups might think you're not taking school seriously if you don't," Bella tells Oat.

[pythbox]

"If the grownups wanted me to take their school seriously they should have built it better," says Oat.

[alicornucopia]

"Do you want to go back to Earth?"

[pythbox]

"No."

"They probably won't fail us literally today, and we can catch up later," says Sindri. "Do you think they'll let us come here to practice in our free time?"

[alicornucopia]

"Yeah."

[pythbox]

"So we could do that!" says Sindri. "If we do extra practice do you want to come with us?"

[alicornucopia]

"Sure."

[pythbox]

"Great," says Sindri. "Have fun flying! You look awesome!"

[alicornucopia]

"Thanks!"

Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

[pythbox]

And soon their time in the battle room is also over. Sindri and Oat are not actively reprimanded for their choices.

[alicornucopia]

Nor is Bella rewarded in any way. She notes this but does not consider it deterring.




That night, she has to get up to pee.

[pythbox]

Bunch of sleeping boys, bunch of sleeping boys...



Oat's bunk is empty. He isn't small enough to hide under that thin blanket.

[alicornucopia]

Well, maybe he had to pee too. The girls' bathroom is far away compared to the nearest one of the more numerous boys' rooms; she just goes in the boys', it's the middle of the night and she can't see where she's going well enough to relish the chance to dance down the corridors.