#just for the record Arlo was trained to leave her alone and give her space

[arlo-venn]

Who is Ottile? I thought you had two cats and one was named Dinova??? Where did a third one come from..🤨

You’re correct! It was originally Rory and Dinova. There’s still only two, but here’s the story:

Chapter One:

When Rory and Dinova came to live with me here after the surrender prevention program they were in, Dinova became severely depressed. Worse than I’d ever seen her; she’d always struggled with Arlo, but even with medication and time to adjust, she wasn’t coping— she would not leave from her shelf in the tool room/basement cat room, stopped eating, stopped grooming. So even though it was one of the hardest decisions I’ve ever had to make, I had to allow the people from the surrender prevention program to find her a more suitable home. They did, and although I’m not allowed to know the details of where she is or who she’s with, I do know that she’s happier and healthier now, and she’s in a home with no dogs. I know it may seem terrible to rehome my eldest child for being unable to cope with my youngest, but Arlo would not be okay without me (and I wouldn’t be okay without him), whereas Dinova can be taken care of by anyone so long as they’re loving and are able to provide a space that she feels comfortable in. I wasn’t able to provide that for her.

Before we lost our home, I’d moved us into a larger, two bedroom home for the same reason— she wasn’t coping in a smaller space with Arlo, even after a few years. Unfortunately, even once I’m approved for disability, I will never realistically be able to afford a home large enough to accommodate the space she needs to comfortably live with a dog again. It would have been selfish of me to keep her with us just because I loved her.

Chapter Two:

Rory had never been an only cat before, not ever in her life. She’d also gone through the trauma of losing her home and her parent for a whole year without being able to understand why, only to lose her sister not long after being reunited with her parent in a bizarre new environment. So, after Dinova left, Rory became incredibly depressed. My silly goofy silky wind ferret alien thing was confused and lethargic and wouldn’t play, not even with her buddy Arlo. This lasted for some time with no improvement.

Eventually, Tyrell adopted Ottilie for Rory. How I came to find and select Ottilie is a whole story in itself, for another day maybe, but— Tyrell paid for Ottilie to be adopted and agreed to cover any emergency vet costs that may arise until we’re back on our feet (and cat food when I am unable to cover it myself). Once we brought her home, Rory was back to normal almost instantaneously. Not only that, but— while Dinova did love Rory, she was still always very standoffish with other pets and had trained Rory not to engage in play with her. Ottilie is the exact opposite— she’s brave and bold, playful and silly, and not shy with any animal, so over time Ottilie re-taught Rory how to play with her own species. It was very sweet watching Rory figure it all out.

Tyrell was also okay with adopting Ottilie because she and Thom had recently lost their 18+ year old gray cat, Winky, which was very very hard on them both. So on top of filling the Dinova shaped hole for Rory (and me), it also filled the little gray cat shaped hole in their hearts, too. Rory is happier than I’ve ever seen her. Ottilie has a home. Wherever she is, Dinova is happy and thriving for the first time in almost 7 years. Tyrell and Thom’s hearts are a little more soothed. My guilt is practically cured.

[whispersafterdusk]

Lost in Time - ch 12

Spring was here; it was still cold but now it was a lot wetter.  He missed the snow in a way, since it was essentially a readily available cold pack for sore muscles.

And oh boy, were Arlo's muscles sore.

Eli had started them out easy; a couple weeks of basic work outs with her slowly introducing new techniques and exercises each Monday with the weekend set aside for rest and recuperation.  But by the second month of spring she'd started ramping things up: harder, more grueling exercises, longer sessions, diet requirements.  He could tell he was starting to put on muscle mass already but all the work left him so stiff and sore that he often got back to his room in the evenings, climbed into bed, and didn't move again until morning came.

He couldn't go straight home tonight though; his day had started bright and early with the group exercises, then he'd spent another afternoon down in the facility, and tonight he was supposed to meet Nora at the Round Table for dinner.  It was the first arranged meeting they'd had in...awhile.  No amount of sore muscles would have him missing this. ((Continued below cut))

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The Barnarock Black was her Thursday evening drink of choice, and being as it was both a Thursday as well as right on heels of a several-hours-long social meet-up with Carol and Antoine, Eli was ready for a drink.

And food.  Being as she hadn't expected the meeting to last as long as it had she'd skipped lunch, and while there were snacks and tea she had to really restrain herself from eating a ton of junk food while trying her best to ignore the rumblings in her stomach.  Thankfully the chatter never really let up so she didn't think anyone had heard her gut screeching for sustenance but once they'd all parted ways she'd all but run down the street toward the Round Table.

On her way through the door she was almost knocked over by Nora leaving; the girl had thrown the door wide open and slammed it (accidentally) into Eli's hand as she'd been reaching for the handle to open it herself.  As Nora shuffled by with a half-apology and all but ran toward the hill leading toward the church Eli stood there both wondering what the heck had prompted her to rush out of there while also trying to awkwardly pinch shut the fresh cut over her middle knuckle before it started to really bleed.

Inside the Round Table she could see Asher at the long side of the counter, Dawa and Dana at the far end of the counter taking up the pair of stools there, Mars and his daughters in a back booth, and Gale and his family were sitting at the round table in the middle of the room.   Sonia was busy buzzing back and forth between tables and the back of the restaurant and Django was nowhere to be seen but based on the number of people in here he was probably up to his ears in food orders.  

"Evening," Asher greeted her as she took a seat next to him.  He tilted his head and got a look at her hand.  "Need something for that?"

"Nah.  It's just a scrape.  Did Django not have her favorite pie or something?"

"Who?"

"Nora, isn't it?  With the church?"

"Oh, yeah - that was Nora. No idea.  Didn't even know she was here until she left - I never seem to notice that side room there."

Eli knew what he was talking about; there was what looked like a newer addition on the front of the restaurant - it had a large bookcase stuffed full of books, a radio on a stand alone cabinet, and a single booth with a pair of loveseats (which wasn't so odd considering that instead of benches or chairs at the other booths there were plush couches that seated 3, maybe 4 if you piled in together).  It was easy to let your attention slide right passed it since you couldn't really see it or see into it unless you crossed the room to the tables on the back wall.

It looked like just Arlo was sitting-

Ah.  Ok then.

Eli inhaled through her teeth - an awkward hiss, of sorts - and sat down at the counter.  It took awhile for Sonia to make it over and take her order; the cut on her knuckle kept oozing and she'd resorted to periodically swiping the blood off with a thumb and then sticking said thumb into her mouth.

"You SURE you don't want something to wrap that in?"

"All the napkins here are cloth.  I'd rather not stain them with a bodily fluid."

Asher rolled his eyes and pulled a rumpled, dark green handkerchief out of his pocket and offered it.  "And before you ask, no, I haven't blown my nose into it.  It's clean but stained so don't worry about adding to it."

As he said the handkerchief WAS stained - looked like oil, and blood too - but she wrapped it around and tied it off.  "Well, at least I won't drip anywhere.  Thanks.  I hate how much hands bleed before clotting up."

"I agree - knees and shins too.  And no problem.  I've actually never, ever needed to blow my nose in one of those - my dad made me carry one around for that purpose and I always end up using it for something else.  It's a pretty gross concept, really...stuffing a crud-filled cloth back into my pocket.  And I'm supposed to use it several times over a day?"  Asher wrinkled his nose at that.  "And I say that after having gutted fish and food animals...guts and blood?   Totally fine.  Snot?  No thank you."

Eli chuckled; he had a point, after all.  He also still had a noticeable bruise across his cheek from a cross-country jog last week where he'd taken a tree limb right to the face when an end piece had snapped off and slapped the rest of it directly back into him as he'd gone to push passed it. "We usually had bandages and tissue glue on hand for little things like this.  I've even stuck industrial tape over cuts to hold it over until I got back to treat it properly.  Drove Peter absolutely insane doing that.  Was good times..."

"Peter?" Asher repeated.

She leaned forward and braced her elbows on the counter, putting her chin in her hands.  "Yeah - he was one of our team medics.  Him and Ashley, kept us pieced together and put all the blood and chunks back where they belonged."

Asher nodded slowly at that.  "Not a bad idea - having a dedicated medical person.  It's not something we typically do unless it's a big expedition.  But, we all have some basic first aid training so it's not like we're heading out without anything at all."

"Do you have assigned squads in your Flying Pigs?  I'm not even sure what an adventuring guild is."

"Not really," he answered.  "We're a sort of grab bag group - we pick and choose who goes where, unless someone was specifically requested for a contract job.  As for what we do we inspect old ruins for dangers and clear them out, protect those who need protecting, and we help map out areas that no one's been to in centuries.  We've been a bit focused on that lately - eventually we'll make better strides out into the Peripheries and the Great Begeondan and get some settlements in place there too but, no lie, those are some of the most dangerous places on the continent.  Full of monsters and rogue AIs, weird weather, extreme temperatures too."

"Sounds like my kind of place."

The look he gave her was somewhere between surprise and suspicion.  "You're...joking, right?"

"Not in the slightest.  Believe it or not there were a lot of wild, wide open places still left in the world back in my time period.  A lot of our training happened out in harsh areas, and sometimes we'd get called in to go track down some idiot tourist or terrorist that had disappeared out there.  Rangers had to be ready for just about anything, in any climate or location, for any reason."

Now he looked less like he thought she was joking and more just genuinely surprised.  "So - I mean.  It just seems weird to me that what survived through the ages were stories of humans living lazy, luxurious lives, with robots doing everything.  And then you say there were wild spaces and hard training and having to be ready at the drop of a hat.   Why was there any need for soldiers, or rangers?  At least, human ones anyway."

Eli shrugged.  "Each time I hear 'robots did everything' it surprises ME because it seems like no one actually gives thought to what that means beyond its surface.  Would YOU want your life in the hands of something that's one hack or power failure away from shutting off entirely, losing all your files, or turning on you?  Most people tended to act honorably and not target the innocent and whatnot but still, there were those who wanted their voices heard or wanted power and control no matter how many people they incidentally or purposely killed.  In hindsight the fact that the leaders of the world worked so hard to keep the nasty, dark, and terrible things out of the public eye seems to have...really slapped the rose colored glasses on, to the detriment of accurate historical record. Granted, "accurate records" were a bit of joke anyway - at least to those who knew what was being to told to military and what was sent out to civilians. Oh, a hospital got hacked? A train engine exploded for no reason? Power shut off mysteriously?  Nah, nothing serious - just "equipment failures" causing weird quirks and shutdowns," Eli said, raising her hands to stick air quotes around 'equipment failures' and all but oozing sarcasm.  "The world was...certainly something, compared to what it is now.  But there's no such thing as a utopia.  People are always going to be unhappy about something, or slip through the cracks of society and feel they have a justifiable reason to make their displeasure known in violent ways.   There's a reason all the nations still had standing armies even though we'd had peace for centuries, before I was even a concept in Fate's outline.  They kept us all busy with public works projects, organized war games - think big but friendly skirmishes with harmless paint-based or laser weapons with sensor suits - and, like I mentioned before, the occasional idiot tourist rescue, but it wasn't all sunshine and daisies unless you were a regular citizen."

Asher let out a soft noise - Eli thought it was 'geez' or something similar - and rubbed at his chin, going silent for a bit.  Sonia brought out Eli's usual beer then disappeared just as quickly as she'd popped up; Eli had half the bottle downed before Asher spoke again.

"Bet you never thought you'd be correcting history books, huh?"

She sat the bottle down and did a half-assed imitation of jazz hands.  "Ta da, I am full of surprises."  That rapid shaking movement dislodged the handkerchief around her knuckles a bit so she untied and then re-tied it back into place, using her teeth this time to help tighten the knot a bit better.

Over the chatter and sounds of cutlery on plates Eli made out the sounds of plodding feet, and shifted on her stool just enough to see Arlo slouching his way toward the door; right as he reached it it opened and Remington was framed in the doorway briefly before he stepped aside.

"Oh, hey - how'd it--" Remington was cut off as Arlo slipped passed him and kept going without a word; the man stared after him a moment.   "--go..." he finished his sentence with a frown, and a shake of his head.  He came inside and up to the counter to take the empty stool on Eli's left.  "Evening, guys."

"Evening.  How's the knee?" Eli asked.

Remington slid his legs around and flexed his leg a bit.  "Not as bad as I thought it'd be, by now.  It hurts but no more than it does when the weather is bad."

"Good to hear.  I wish flex-gel still existed...that stuff worked wonders."

"Well, we make do," Remington chuckled.  "What's tomorrow looking like?"

"Starting with a warm up run, then I have a couple new things to show.  They're...hard, so I won't keep you all too long at it, and you'll have the weekend to recover like normal."

"Something to look forward to, then," Remington replied.  

Sonia came back with Asher and Eli's orders, took Remington's, and disappeared again.

As she picked up her fork Eli offered the two men a small grin.  "I probably should have warned you both to eat light tonight.  It's going to be a rough morning."

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"Before today...no idea...what a burpee was," Asher wheezed from where he was laying flat on his back on the grass.  "Can't say I care for them....or the reverse ones..."

"A sentiment I can get behind," Sam groaned.  She wasn't laying down but she was sitting a couple feet from Asher with her arms around her legs along with her head nearly between her knees.  

Remington was off to the side finishing up some additional push ups with a sack of sand on his back for weight; Eli had let him do a few burpees to see how his knee held up and had eventually decided not to risk blowing the joint out.  While Sam and Asher did regular and reverse burpees with one-pound sacks of sand in each hand Remington had to do lunges, sit ups, and push ups with a five pound sack.  

For whatever reason though Arlo wasn't present.  

Earlier, before they'd started on their run, Eli had caught Remington and Sam sharing a knowing look, and when asked neither of them owned up to knowing why Arlo had skipped today.  She'd decided not to press the issue and had gone about the morning as she'd planned; being as the burpees had wiped everyone out she was content to not do their cool down jog and was just settling on the top of the fence when she spied Arlo's figure coming toward them from Portia's gates. He was...slouching a bit, and looked a little tired.  

"Morning," she called when he was within not-quite-shouting distance.

"Morning.  Sorry, didn't mean to miss today."

"No problem.  I can do a repeat if you're still up for it."

From his spot still flat on the ground Asher raised a hand.  "Run - run while you still can."

Eli snorted.  "Well, yeah - running is part of the routine."

"Not what I meant," Asher chuckled.  He rolled over and groaned as he got to his feet.  "I've got to get back out to the facility...maybe lay down somewhere that isn't wet and muddy for a bit before I get dragged into the depths to watch some old folks fart around in piles of dust."

With a smile Eli slid off the fence.  "Remind them to leave things where they found it and to not try turning anything on.  Going to be hard enough as it is to unlock personal stations without them tripping the lock out mechanisms."

"They've been fairly good at keeping their hands to themselves now that they have Stewart to entertain them but I'll remind them.  See you guys later."

With that Asher headed out of the fence gate and headed toward town; he was walking in a slow, wincing manner, and Eli made a mental note to go a bit easy on them on the next couple of work days.  A few moments later and Arlo was standing at the fence - on the outer side - and after a pause he sighed.

"I have something I need to speak to you privately about, if you have time."

"Sure."  She hopped off the fence and looked to Sam and Remington.   "If you want to do your cool downs that's up to you but otherwise I'll see you guys Monday morning, or whenever I next run into you."

She left through the gate and walked alongside Arlo down the road heading toward the shoreline; by her estimate they were halfway to the harbor before he started speaking.

"I wanted your opinion on something because it technically involves you.  But first I need to ask - have you noticed anyone treating you differently, or rudely, lately?"

Eli shook her head.  "Not that I've noticed.  There's still some people that I think I make nervous but they're also not anyone I speak to or see often."  She paused and then let out a small huff of laughter.  "I think I'm doing a pretty good job proving I'm harmless to people I see on a day to day basis."

Arlo nodded at that and his pace slowed just a bit.  "Have you interacted with Nora or Lee much?"

"Ha, no.  Nora runs away from me and I think Lee would walk straight through the side of a building to avoid walking on the same street as me.  I do notice he gets a bit louder in his sermons in the plaza if he sees me nearby but he doesn't directly single me out."

"So, you don't think Lee has had too much influence on how others are treating you?"

Eli slowed to a stop; Arlo took a few more steps before stopping but he didn't turn around.  "Not that I can tell.  But I'm guessing he's got some sort of influence over YOU and I'm at the center of it, right?"

He sighed heavily, sounding annoyed.  "Yes, unfortunately."  For several moments he stood there silently, then finally turned around to look back at her.  "Nora and I were sort of dating.  I'm not really sure if we were officially a couple or not.  There's...something there, but I don't know what.  The thing is, she broke things off with me last night because of my association with you."

Eli raised an eyebrow at that.  "Don't tell me she thinks you were cheating?"

"No, nothing like that," he answered quickly.  "She's not happy that I'm openly associating with something the Church is so against."

"...the past," Eli sighed; Arlo nodded in response.  "You know that's a bit ridiculous, right?"

"The Church has its views, and I have my own regarding technology from the old world.  I agree that there's a lot of dangerous things left behind from your time period.  But I also agree that not all of it could possibly be bad.  If it was ALL bad I feel like there wouldn't BE a past for us to be studying.  I know Nora strongly believes we shouldn't be using things from the past but I also know she's changed her mind on a few things once she'd directly experienced it or learned about it.   Knowing that, I feel like Lee is responsible for her...stance, I guess, regarding associating with you."

"So confront him about it."

"That's...something I'm considering," he replied after a pause.  "But what I wanted to talk to you about was your own personal experience with Portia's townsfolk.  Gale was pretty direct about wanting to hear about any sort of trouble that Lee is causing, in the context of it causing YOU trouble.  But this doesn't directly affect you in any way, it just affects me.  If it's not your life he's interfering with then I don't know if I should tell Gale and risk rocking the boat."

"I think you should," Eli said, crossing her arms and glancing over a shoulder toward the distant and yet somehow looming pinnacle that the Church sat on.  "If she wanted to break things off it should be HER decision, not because some crusty evangelizer told her to. No preacher or employer or authority figure should be free to meddle to that degree in someone's personal life.  Not to mention that he's just asking for Balance to beckon and Judgement to come reckon..."

Arlo looked briefly confused by that last bit; Eli just shrugged - she could always explain the phrase to him later if he was interested.   "-look, even if it's not affecting me directly it's clear I'm being used as a sort of weapon here.  I could care less if someone is cursing my name up, down, and sideways, but I really don't like the idea that I'm essentially being used as a political bludgeon.  In fact, I think I'LL go talk to Nora and get the real story out of her."

"I'd rather she not know-"

"Do you really think she'd just expect you not to tell anyone?" Eli interrupted.  "Or that no one would notice you two split and not have questions?"

"I... I guess not."  He sighed heavily again and tilted his head back to stare up into the sky.  "I just don't want to cause a rift between anyone."

"Let me see what I can find out and THEN we can decide if we want to rock this particular boat or not.  Might be that IF Lee was behind this, and IF he thinks he got away with it, he might try it again with other people and then THAT might actually affect me directly.  If anything it's worth it to try and stop that before the metaphorical rocking ends up capsizing instead."

Arlo nodded. "All right, I guess.  I'm going to head back to the Corps building.  Let me know what you found out."

"Will do."

They walked back to town in silence and at the base of the hill near the plaza Arlo kept going while Eli took a sharp left to head to the path that spiraled up to where the church sat on top of a ruins (and if it was the location she thought it was it had once been several floors of administrative offices, a number of clothing boutiques, and a ground floor restaurant).  By the time she got to the top and was looking at the church's doors that familiar feeling of nostalgia had hit her...nostalgia felt like a strange emotion to be having but she supposed it was a step up from the usual soul-crushing gut punch she usually got when she let herself think about something she recognized.

"Knock knock, anyone home," she found herself muttering as she shouldered the door open and stepped into the quiet chapel.  

It was nice in here, at least - nothing opulent or over the top.   Pews, carpet down the aisle, banners and a chandelier, stained glass windows and murals on the walls.  There was a fountain near the back wall behind the pulpit (which was just a small podium with a book sitting open on it), and she thought she could see a piano back there too.

The only thing breaking up the silence was the gurgle of water and the rhythmic sounds of sweeping coming from somewhere to her left; Eli walked up the small ramp into the sanctuary proper and from that spot she spied Nora off in the corner with a broom in hand.

The girl looked up to her and Eli saw her tense up.

"Morning. If you've got a moment I'd like to speak with you," Eli said.  Not much of a greeting but the girl already didn't like her so no amount of politeness was probably going to change much.

"I uh...I need to finish sweeping."  The girl was gripping her broom like she thought Eli was going to attack her; Eli wondered what exactly Lee had been telling her.

"That's fine.  I can wait."

It was clear Nora had been hoping Eli would just leave but instead she watched silently as Eli moved a bit further into the room and sat down on the back pew there.  Eli kept looking forward, admiring what she could see of the murals on the nearby wall; eventually she heard the sweeping start up again and could track Nora by sound as the woman finished up in that corner and moved down to the entryway, then back up and across into the corner on the right.  She heard the scrape of a metal dust pan and the clatter of what she guessed was the top of a trash can opening and closing, and then silence.  Eli let the silence stretch on for a bit before turning around; Nora seemed like she was debating whether she should run out the door or not but froze when she noticed Eli looking at her.

"Good to go?"

"Go...where?"

"I figured we could just step outside so if your minister shows up he can't yell at me for being on church property."

Nora inhaled and exhaled slowly then nodded, and mutely headed out the door; Eli followed along as the girl headed off to the right, to a wooden platform that was similar to the other wooden platforms that made up sections of the path that led up here -- it lined up with the path, in fact, and made it look like whoever had built it had intended to keep going up and around into the sky.  She had a slight twinge of discomfort from the fact the platform gave a clear view of the land around Portia which included quite a few destroyed buildings.

 Don't think about it.

"All right," she said then, blowing out a breath.  "I'll get right to it: Arlo told me.  And I want to know if that was YOUR decision or if Lee put you up to it.  Because he's not sure and I'm not happy to be in the middle of this."

Nora winced slightly and rubbed at an arm, and at first didn't respond.  Eli stuck her hand in her pockets and purposely looked to the left and down into the tree farm while trying to ignore the ruined observatory that she could still see out of the corner of her eye.

"We talked about it...and I agreed, so it was my decision," Nora finally said.  "The relics of the past are dangerous, we shouldn't be embracing anything from that time period."

Eli turned her attention back to the girl.  "Including me?"

"It's..."

"Look, I get it - you church folk aren't going to like that I exist. I'm a living reminder of how humanity almost wiped themselves out.  I'm not asking you to like me.  I am asking you if YOU made the decision to break things off with Arlo, on your own, for your own reasons, or if Lee convinced you to do it because in his mind it was the right thing to do because of Arlo's associating with me."

Nora's shoulders slumped a bit and again she was silent for a long period.  "...I guess it's a bit of both.  Lee's said that-"

"-let me stop you right there.  Lee hasn't bothered talking to me, period.  Whatever he's said I intend to do or teach is something he pulled directly out of his own ass."  At that Nora's eyes widened a bit but Eli didn't know if it was due to the language or because of some possibility that she'd exposed Lee for lying.  "Here's the thing.  I know a lot about a lot of dangerous things everyone seems afraid of - AIs, weapons, computers, devices.  Just because I know how something works, or worked, doesn't mean I can replicate it here.  For every one thing I could maybe manage to write up a technical readout for there's fifty others that I can't.  I know how to put a plasma pulse rifle together but I couldn't begin to tell you how to make one starting from a raw material base; I could describe step by step how to troubleshoot an anti-grav propulsion unit but hand me every single separate part, down to the nuts and bolts, and I'd have no clue how to assemble it.  There's a lot of things that, if it already exists, I could probably get it working again but there's no way I could build it from the ground up because even if I knew everything about everything, the fact remains that your technological level just isn't where it needs to be to MAKE anything."

Nora simply stood and listened silently, and was staring at some indeterminate point on the horizon past the tree farm.

"...so," Eli said into the silence that followed.  "Was it Lee, or was it your choice?"

Nora hung her head.  "You already know the answer to that."

"I was hoping I was wrong.  So, barring Lee's meddling, WOULD you have made that choice?"

To her surprise Nora lifted her head and answered immediately.  "Yes.  I think so, anyway.  Just...not like I did, or when I did."

Eli nodded approvingly at the admission.  "All right, we're getting somewhere then.  What's the ACTUAL reasoning then?"

"I just... I don't know.  I'm attracted to him - he's brave, and handsome, and kind. But I feel so...  I love his stories, and love spending time with him, but there's so many times where once he runs out of stories it gets...it's like we run out of things to talk about.  We don't have much in common it seems.  I try to find things to talk about but its usually the same things each time - the weather, the news.  I've even tried telling him about books I like but I feel silly trying to explain an entire book's plot. And..."

Eli raised an eyebrow.  "And?" she prompted - she wasn't going to let her clam up now that the proverbial dam had apparently burst.

"-I was only supposed to stay in Portia for two years.  I asked to stay longer and was granted an extension to my mission with the Church, and while I love Portia I can't stay here forever.  I have schooling to finish in Atara and then I'd like to settle down and start a family, and Arlo wants to join the Flying Pigs and would be traveling all over.  I don't think either of us can stay with the other unless someone wants to give up a dream."

"Aha..." Eli muttered.  "That I can understand.  Mine and my husband's jobs kept us apart quite a bit but neither of us would have ever asked the other one to give up their career."

"How...did it work out, then?"

Eli gave her a small smile.  "We enjoyed every moment we got together, when we had the time. Truth be told, my marriage was arranged - I just got super lucky in that I actually fell in love with the person my parents picked."  At Nora's shocked look she held up a hand.  "I know, it sounds weird - arranged marriages weren't at all popular back then, and were even against the law in a lot of places.  But all the men I was around were all soldiers or rangers, and I didn't want to marry another serviceman.  My parents picked someone I knew in gradeschool so he wasn't a total stranger, and we ended up fitting together nicely."

"Phyllis ran away from an arranged marriage...I didn't think one could be successful."

"Don't get me wrong - I thought long and hard before I asked my parents to do that for me, AND asked them to make it clear to whoever needed to hear it that I wouldn't be putting my boots away if I got married.  It's not something I would ever suggest to another person.   But, to get back on track, I'm only mentioning my marriage and circumstance because it's entirely possible you and Arlo could make it work even if you're apart for long periods of time.  It just boils down to, do you think that's what you'd want?"

Again Nora fell quiet, and Eli stayed where she was while the other walked over to the edge of the platform and leaned against it with  her arms folded across the top plank of the fence. Standing there, in the quiet, Eli could hear footsteps coming up the path and assumed they were about to be interrupted - probably by Lee.  She gave Nora a couple more minutes before clearing her throat to grab her attention.

"Give it some thought, and be honest with yourself.  And when you have your answer, walk your happy little butt down to the Corps building and be honest with Arlo.  You're still welcome to dislike me," Eli added after a moment, smiling slightly.  "I hear someone coming though so I should probably make myself scarce."

"All right...I'll do that," Nora replied, voice quiet.

Eli nodded to her and then turned to plod back down the path.  As she expected she passed Lee coming up; he gave her a brief sour look then turned his nose up to her and sped up to get by her faster.  She managed to keep from rolling her eyes until she had her back to him and once she'd circled around enough to put him entirely out of sight she sped up into a trot -- may as well get her cool down jog done.  She would check in with Arlo later this afternoon instead (it made more sense to give Nora time to go talk to him on her own, before Eli went to tell him what she'd said -- it'd also mean a lot more for him to hear it from Nora).

As she passed under Portia's gate she paused at the split in the road; ordinarily she'd jog down to the harbor and back with the others for their cool down run.  If she hung a right here she'd go up to the tree farm and she could easily keep going and check in at the facility - today was supposed to be one of her free days to do...whatever she felt like, but she didn't have much in mind to do.  Maybe she could get back to rummaging through the spare parts and start the onerous duty of stripping down and re-working the auxiliary power bank to see if they could convert it over to wind power.

Yeah, that would probably be a better use of her time today.

She paused to stretch and then continued on, jogging up the road; there was someone coming down the road toward her - someone she didn't recognize.  She offered the man a smile and moved off the road into the grass, and the man returned the smile and offered a little wave as she went by.

As she got to the tree farm's gate it swung open and out came Dawa, and when he saw her he waved at her and gestured for her to pause.

"Hey, Eli!"

"Hello Dawa.  You need something?"

"Was Selene home when you left?"

"Uh...  I actually have no idea.  I usually get up and out of the house before she does and I spent the morning out exercising with the Corps folks."

Dawa nodded and grunted.  "Ah, all right.  Was hoping to possibly save myself a trip down there.  But no big deal - it's not like I'm walking across the continent," he chuckled.

"I'm just out for a jog, I could turn around and see if she's there and then send her your way."

Dawa considered that a moment, then nodded.  "If you don't mind.   I've got a lot of work I need to get done by tonight and any minute I can save is worth it."

Eli raised an eyebrow.  "Yeah?  Need a hand with anything?"

"Nah, it's just a lot of chopping and getting things delivered on time.  I can manage it...I think."

"Fair enough.  I'll go have a look and come back up this way if she's not there."

"Thanks Eli!" he called after her as she turned around and jogged back down the path.

She caught up to that same man from before on the way back; he'd stopped not too far from where she'd first passed him, and was sitting on a bit of broken stone off the side of the road watching her approach.  With how he had his feet propped up she could see his brown leather boots were worn and had a few holes in them, and they matched his equally worn duster coat; the man himself also looked weathered and old.

"Hello again," she said as she came up.

"Hey," was the man's response.

When she got back to the house she did in fact find Selene working in her factory and let her know Dawa was looking for her.  She got a sort of distracted, non-committal promise to go talk to him and then Eli left the builder to whatever it was she was piecing together and once again jogged up the path toward the tree farm.

The man was still sitting there; he'd taken his coat off and had it draped over the rock beside him.  His clothes were baggy but were in considerably better condition than his coat and boots were.

"You stuck in a rut?" was the man's gravelly greeting as she jogged near him for a third time.

She laughed quietly.  "Just playing messenger for a bit."

She heard him chuckling behind her as she kept going; it didn't take long to let Dawa know Selene would be along in a bit and then she continued on out to the facility.  Down there it was easy to lose track of time and before she knew it it was early evening - far later than she'd actually intended to be down here...she REALLY needed to recreate a damn Hi-Def or, bare minimum, get a pocket watch or something.

At the very least the tourist man wasn't still sitting on his rock when she went by there again; she did spot him sitting at the nearest booth in the Round Table though, and offered him a nod when she thought he was looking her way.  He didn't respond but that wasn't a big deal - at least no one could claim she wasn't friendly to strangers.  

"Eli!"

She paused, halfway to a stool at the counter, and turned when she heard Arlo.  He looked to be in better spirits and was waving her over to the table where he, Remington, Asher, and Petra were sitting together.

As she headed over Arlo slid to the side to make room for her on the end of the couch next to him and Petra shifted around to the other side; in the few seconds it took to cross the room and sit down Sonia had come over to the table for her order.  Remington, Petra, and Asher all had half-finished drinks in front of them.

"Did you find that sensor thing you were looking for?" Asher asked as she sat down.

"Nope," she answered.  "Granted, I didn't spend too much time looking for it though.  Started in on tearing down the aux unit and making a list of what needs replacing.  We're going to need an amp converter for sure but I'm fairly confident we can manage to make it work."

"That's good news," Petra said.  "We already have the wind generator blueprints and have several up near South Block that are working just fine.  If you can give us an idea of the power output that's needed we can see if we need to alter those blueprints."

"I'm still working on that.  The main hitch is deciding what numbers to use and how to get them - we won't be using the same amount of power that the facility did in its hey day but I also don't know of any other number to use just yet.  I might have to ask Stewart to set aside a week and just run everything from lights to toasters down there to see what consumption level it can even hit, then add some zeroes to account for potential future increases and then see what I get."

Petra nodded.  "That makes sense. I just hope the wind coming down from the bluffs would be enough."

"Well, if its not sufficient then my backup plan was water turbines instead.  There's that waterfall that's not too far away...biggest hurdle then would be waterproofing all the equipment."

At that Petra rubbed at her chin.  "Water turbines and waterproofing... It might work so long as we can avoid altering Portia's water quality."

"Shouldn't be any different from the motorized boats I see out in the harbor with the exception that there won't be any fuel runoff in the equation," Eli replied.  "That ought to make it pretty clean."

Further discussion was interrupted as Sonia and Django brought out all of their orders together and they got to eating; when they finished Petra and Asher excused themselves, paid, and headed out.  As Remington ordered a second lemonade Eli subtly leaned toward Arlo.

"Did she come find you?" It was barely above a whisper, and neither Sonia nor Remington seemed to have heard it.

Arlo nodded.  "She did.  We worked it out.  Still friends."  His voice was equally as quiet.

Eli straightened and flashed him a brief smile - she didn't need details; she was just glad Nora had followed through and Eli wouldn't have to have that conversation in her stead.

"So..." Arlo said then, voice loud and clear.  "I hear I missed learning what a burpee is."

--------------------------------------

The three of them ended up sitting and chatting for quite awhile, then moved on to the back room for a couple games of darts (Remington won every single game).  As they'd stood and headed back Eli again nodded to the old man in the booth and this time got a half wave and smile in response. When they came out of the game room later the man was still there nursing a single coffee.  He offered them a quiet good evening and was digging in his coat pocket for gols as they were filing out through the door.

"Any plans for tomorrow?" Arlo asked, as they stood together just beyond the edge of the extended patio roof outside of the Round Table.

"Sleeping, hopefully," Remington chuckled.

Eli shrugged. "Not really.  I was thinking of seeing if Selene had a rod and reel I can borrow.  I'm determined to see a live frog fish for myself - it's still so hard to wrap my head around the idea of bizarre animal hybrids."

"You should talk to Qiwa - I'm sure he'd be happy to tell you all about the native fish in this region," Remington said.  "He's the one who usually wears purple, if that helps."

She considered that a moment, then nodded; on her To Do list was checking with the local school to see if they had books they could lend her on wildlife, geography, and cultures of the current time period but she kept forgetting about it until it was too late in the evening to catch anyone there.  "Probably a good idea.  I need to start making time to learn about the world as it is, instead of focusing on telling everyone on how it was."  She paused for a breath then looked to Arlo.   "If you'd like to make up for today I'll have time tomorrow."

"Sounds good.  In the morning, as usual?"

"Works for me.  See you tomorrow," she said, smiling and heading off.

The lights were still on in Selene's factory - had she ever gone to talk to Dawa?  Eli hoped so.  Inside the house it was quiet; Eli took a quick bath and tiptoed into her room wrapped in just a towel.  Her pajamas were not on the edge of her bed though, which where she swore she'd left them this morning.  Maybe she'd overshot the edge when she'd tossed them there?  As she came around to the other side of the bed to check she saw a strange pink lump partially sticking out from under the bedskirt, and under it was a single pajama pantleg.

She reached out with one bare foot, grabbed the pantleg fabric with her toes, and pulled; sliding out from under the bed came the biggest, roundest, pinkest cat she'd ever seen.  It was lounging on top of her pajamas and seemed not at all disturbed by the fact it had been dragged out of its little hiding spot.

"...excuse me, who are you and also I need those."  Eli had to let the towel flap open as she bent down to roll the rather sausage-shaped cat off her clothing; when she had retrieved the pajamas she dropped the towel over the animal and heard a rather confused "mrrp" noise from under it.

Selene hadn't mentioned that she owned a cat, much less a neon pink one.

The world was a very weird place nowadays.