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

[pythbox]

"Is that what the matter is for you, too?" asks Oat, turning to Sindri.

"Yeah, I guess. I just - I don't like it when people are unhappy."

"I don't either."

Sindri smiles tentatively at Oat. Oat attempts to smile back, then flinches and stops.

[alicornucopia]

"What was that?" Bella asks Oat, tilting her head.

[pythbox]

"What was what?"

[alicornucopia]

"You sort of started smiling and then changed your mind, how come?"

[pythbox]

"It looked weird to Sindri. Didn't it?"

"A little," Sindri admits.

[alicornucopia]

"This is the weirdest dumbest mutant power."

[pythbox]

"I still don't think it's a mutant power at all," says Oat.

[alicornucopia]

"What else would it be?"

[pythbox]

"Perfectly normal people go around noticing what other people are feeling all the time without being telepaths," says Sindri.

"Yes, I've seen them do it and I have no idea how," says Oat. "But they don't have holes in their heads. Or do they?"

"I never have..."

[alicornucopia]

"I don't have a hole in my head," Bella says. "Anyway, for most people it works on everyone, not just Sindri or any one person like that."

[pythbox]

"Is it so much stranger, mine working on only one person rather than not working at all, that it has to be a mutant power?"

"It's pretty weird," says Sindri. "I don't know if it's definitely-a-mutant weird."

[alicornucopia]

"Well, but Oat is a mutant and doesn't know what his power is," Bella says. "And I can't think of another way it would be."

[pythbox]

"Most people don't get their powers this young anyway," says Sindri. "I don't have mine yet."

[alicornucopia]

"Well, I have mine, it happens. I couldn't be here if I didn't."

[pythbox]

"What do you mean," Oat asks Bella, "when you say you can't think of another way it would be?"

[alicornucopia]

"I don't know any other things that happen to people that might make a Sindri-shaped hole in your head and make nobody else make sense to you."

[pythbox]

"That still doesn't mean it's my mutant power," says Oat.

"Isn't there a way to tell?" says Sindri.

[alicornucopia]

"I don't know," muses Bella.

[pythbox]

"I think there is a way to tell but I don't know what it is," says Sindri. "The way my parents talk about it, they know for sure I don't have mine yet, and how could they know that if there wasn't a way to tell which things are and aren't a power?"

[alicornucopia]

"Well, it would also have to be something that suddenly appears," says Bella. "And is weird."

[pythbox]

"When did yours suddenly appear?"

[alicornucopia]

"We're not sure because nobody was trying to telepath me until I started first grade."

[pythbox]

"...Why was somebody trying to telepath you then?"

[alicornucopia]

"Because I kept tripping and having bruises and they wanted to check to make sure my mom wasn't hitting me but she wasn't. They telepathed her instead when it didn't work on me. But it has to have been earlier than that because I broke monitors," she adds thoughtfully.

[pythbox]

"So yours didn't even suddenly appear, so there should be a way to tell," says Sindri.

"Maybe your parents were mistaken," says Oat.

"They usually aren't," says Sindri.