IC INBOX

[gobo_projection]

WELCOME TO YOUR PRIVATE CHANNEL, CCC-REDHORSE. FOR SECURE COMMUNICATION, USE 134.64.202.69 *** CCC-REDHORSE has joined 134.64.202.69 <CCC-REDHORSE> This is Reira Akaba! <CCC-REDHORSE>I'll try to answer you but sometimes I'm busy or sleeping, so I don't think about the message right away. <CCC-REDHORSE>(I might note old stuff down too...)

Comments

[unholey]

[Reira isn't coming out her room. That's fine. That's to be expected, really, after everything. It's why he came downstairs with the food rather than an invitation to come back upstairs. Fugo reaches to open the door and slowly slides in; he doesn't entirely close the door behind him. Rather, he leaves it standing ajar with about a hand's width of space between it and the door frame. His steps are quiet as he approaches Reira. As he gets closer, she'll be able to see that he's brought everything in pairs: two bento boxes, two (covered, so nothing spills) soup bowls, two pairs of chopsticks, two spoons.]

Would you like some company? We don't have to talk. [He bends down a little, not far, but enough that Reira won't have to uncurl too far to accept the food that has been brought to her.] And if you'd rather be alone, that's okay too.

[The food Fugo has brought isn't that complicated. There's no heaping serving of pasta, or vegetables cooked with fragrant-smelling oil and garlic. Just some rice, fish, and miso soup.]

'reira you have to leave the ballpit first tho' '....'

[gobo_projection]

[It is probably not recommended to eat in a ball pit. Actually it's definitely not recommended, but Reira doesn't say anything about that immediately. The shape of the bento boxes are after all all too familiar, and for a minute when she looks toward the arachne in the small hall leading from doorway to room, the goblin feels herself tearing up.

She can already tell exactly what those bowls are for, why there's chopsticks, and what's probably in the boxes.

Reira nods, and while it's not clear what the sniffling young teen is nodding to, company is probably something she needs.]

[unholey]

Okay.

[Even though it's not clear what Reira is nodding to, what exactly she wants, it's at least progress. She's at least communicating, even if she doesn't want to talk. When Fugo speaks, he keeps his own tone calm and quiet.]

Do you want to eat in your room somewhere? Or out in the sitting room?

[gobo_projection]

Mnh...

[She shuffles a bit toward the edge of the ballpit, closest to the hall. Fugo's words at least have made her realize where she shouldn't eat, even if she'd rather not leave the room.

This can be enough though right?] ...here's good, [she sniffs, partly leaning against a net strung down from the ceiling for climbing.] ...I don't wanna go upstairs...

[unholey]

[Now that it's clear Reira doesn't want to leave, Fugo moves into the room and meets her at the edge of the ball pit. While waiting for her, he idly nudges an escaped ball back into the pit with the side of his foot.]

Alright. We don't have to go up there. Where should we sit?

[gobo_projection]

...'s here bad..?

[It's probably bad. Even if she's got the edge of the ball pit to rest the food on, it's probably a bad spot.

She could go to her room, but for now she just fiddles with the bento box.]

[unholey]

It's not bad, just a little awkward. If you want to eat here, we can eat here. We'll just have to be careful not to drop anything into the ...

[Fugo pauses. Genuinely, this is his first encounter with a ball pit. One can almost see the perplexed speech bubble with a large, bold ? above his head.]

Play area.

[He'll just go with that.]

[gobo_projection]

...I can be careful.

[The most careful. The most careful you've ever seen, even if she has to use timestop to catch a spill-]

...'s a ball pit.

[unholey]

Okay. We'll eat here, then.

[One of the few things-- (many things, really, if Fugo allowed himself to accept them)-- that's useful about his extra limbs is that when they're braced against the floor, they make it easy to stay balanced, even though his hands are full, as he settles into a seated position on the edge of the pit. He sets the bowls of soup, covered with lids to keep warm between them, between them; on top of the lid, he leaves a pair of chopsticks and a soup spoon.]

A ball pit, huh. [Fugo places his own bento over his knees and peers into it. It's a pretty self-explanatory name. He waits to open it for Reira to settle.] ... this is the first time I've seen one. Did it come with the house?

[The house, as he's come to understand, exists because of Mana. So it could have been a gift from her, of sorts, for the girl who would make it her home.]

[gobo_projection]

[To that, Reira numbly shakes her head, slowly eating a bit of soup.]

...Tsukikage made it, on one of my birthdays. ...it was...it was when Ron was still here, so it was supposed to be our playroom....since we only had one hill, it would mean we would be able to play here if people were busy upstairs, [she explains, sniffling. It's a surprise perhaps, that she could even say all of that. But then again perhaps saying simple facts helps.]

He built a lot of stuff. ...the extra rooms in this hill were what he built...

[unholey]

[Ah. He wasn't expecting that. After all, digging out an entire second wing of an underground home is one hell of an undertaking. But it lines up with what he knows about Tsukikage: stubborn, hard working, and dedicated to Reira's well-being.]

I didn't know that. [Fugo eats quietly for a while, considering the information. Ron is a new name to him. Another child, maybe. Another someone who is no longer here. This room ... is probably full of memories for her.] What else did he build?

[gobo_projection]

[A numb nod.] ...yeah. ...Tsukikage did a lot in the house. He wanted to build it alone, but he kept working too hard...but he wanted a house that would be safe, and couldn't explode like the apartment did.

[There's a story there.

Perhaps another time.] ...I asked Mana to do most of it before he... ...before he worked himself too hard, [She ultimately phrases it.] ...And then after that, he made the extra rooms past the kitchen....and then the big pit for his room, and all the rooms past it...

...the second hill, we got Mana to do though. ...but it doesn't make all the other rooms less amazing, [she whispers quietly.]