It is an odd sort or perspective you would have. On the one hand, you are about fifty years old in terms of your experience; on the other, you're still a child, living like a child despite all you have seen. You tend to fall back into being a child, yet you cannot escape your knowledge.
That is to say, there is a level on which you are an elderly adult looking at a little girl, seeing her as cute and innocent and untouched by the world, and a degree to which you are her peer, another kid in the neighborhood who is your friend.
(My recollection is that she is about twelve; is that consistent with yours?)
--M. J. Young
Close; actually, I believe that I landed in fifth grade for almost everything.
Doing the math, most kids start kindergarten already being five (I started at four and turned five just as the school year began) and turn six as the year progresses. Thus grade one begins at six, two at seven, three at eight, four at nine, and in grade five they are ten going on eleven (in my case, it was nine for a very little bit and ten for the rest of the time).
Twelve year olds are sixth (mostly second semester) or seventh (mostly first semester) graders.
Of course, that's just my deduction from how these things normally work; if Northgate sends kids to school later or Kat herself has been left back a couple times then she'd be twelve, and she looks at least a couple years older than me.
§
Precisely. There's an extent which I should keep away from her, as even the training I'm giving her may be serving to disconnect her from that unblemished purity, but also an extent to which I don't want to stop being with my friend.
At least the disconnect comes when she isn't around and I can say clearly to myself, "This is a good strategy to be sure that I'm not a total social outcast in high school, and she'll need the tools to defend herself from bullying when I'm not around if we get that far."
That decades-old thinking still plagues, though; what if when she gets older and I don't she decides with the rest of them that I'm not cool? "Well, come on. It's high school. I've done more dangerous things before. None of them will be able to push me around; I'm smaller, but scrappier."
My little pep monologue. Still, there's something daunting about high school, and always will be, I expect, until I experience it for myself.
Right, so Kat is actually turning eleven this year at some point. I was pretty close. You, meanwhile, look to be ten, maybe nine, so the distance is not so bad yet. And she already knows that you're really a lot older, but somehow like Peter Pan you never grew up. She lives in Northgate. There are a lot of people in Northgate who aren't quite normal, and most of them think that's a good thing.
I recall that your apartment also has a swimming pool. I don't know whether you were showing Kat everything or just the gym and the living quarters. ("Everything" might also include the computer center.) Your invitation to her to visit whenever she wants has an extra bit of benefit given that there's a gymnasium and she can tell her mom she's going to go work in Kyler's gym. After all, parents sometimes pay money to provide such benefits for their children.
--M. J. Young
True. I am showing her everything, yes. Going to have a key made for her eventually, if that's the sort of thing that's feasible.
Kat's mother swings by to pick her up, and an excited girl runs out and starts saying, "Mom, you should see this place, they've got a gym and a swimming pool and all kinds of stuff."
Mom's eyes find Mariska. "Thank you for having her. It sounds like she enjoyed it."
"Yes," Kat says, apparently reminded of her manners, "thank you for letting me come over, Mariska."
Characteristically, Mariska shrugs. "You can come over whenever you want. Kyler enjoys having you here."
"Can I come tomorrow?"
"Now, you don't want to wear out your welcome, honey," mother says in a motherly voice.
"Really, it's not a problem," Mariska says. "After all, the place is really too big for the two of us. If Kyler's up for the company, it's not a problem for me."
--M. J. Young
"Psh, how could I say no to a face like that?" I grin.
"Whenever you want to come over, you can." I don't mention to her mother that I intend to make her a key; the mother may not approve of that, I think.
"Watch what you say about my face," Kat retorts.
"Now, Kat, I'm sure he meant that in a nice way," her mother says.
"Yeah, he'd better have."
--M. J. Young
Smile. Blink slowly. Hold my temper in check better than I may ever have in response to a tone like that. Consider the fact that she is a child and the fact that she already knows that I could kill her and her mother a hundred different ways in the time it's taken for me to think this. Disregard her tone as insulting for the moment, determine what she could possibly mean... Eureka. Girls are so strange. Let's approach this backwards to make it less of a compliment; don't want to scare her or her mother off. Smile, don't miss the smile.
(Thought processing is quick. Don't wanna mess with the intuition.)
"I see nothing unpleasant about your face, Kat." Smile, speak carefully, go for a genuinely confused affect, which shouldn't be difficult; girls are so confusing. Purposeful to say "not unpleasant" rather than "pleasant;" doubtful that it's the compliment she wants to hear, but I'll read her mind to see how she takes it.
Of course, if she breaks down crying, I pretty much know that she's serious and I'll be ready to keep her from running away in such a state. Girls are confusing (as stated several times), but I don't deem such a reaction likely; still, I am definitely one of if not the cutest guy in school, and I have blatantly showered my affection solely on her. I'll be quite ready for such a reaction, to reach out and grab her arm if she goes to run.
"You think so?" she fishes.
"Oh, absolutely," Mariska says. "A girl could look a lot worse than you, and frankly many of them do."
Apparently mollified if not satisfied, she turns to leave with her mother.
--M. J. Young
"See you again."
Ask Mariska if she wanted to do anything other than stay in tonight.
If not, return to my Saturday training regimen, which is essentially similar to my other training regimens.
She laughs.
"Were you thinking of taking me to a movie, little big brother? Will your girlfriend be jealous if we go out to dinner together? You know, she really did want you to tell her how pretty she is."
--M. J. Young
I give her a smile. "I noticed. She's a bit young for me, though I don't want to let her down hard. If you want to go out somewhere, we can. I don't want you to feel like I keep you cooped up all the time."
"Cooped up? I go to work five days a week. We have a thoroughly more-than-modern kitchen and a pantry and freezer full of minimal-labor meals. I don't drink--your example on that, it's better not to lose focus--and I don't really dance, and the last time I gambled it was so I could get close to a killer who was trying to conquer the world.
"I'll bet the movies in this world are a real trip. Do they even make superhero movies in a world that has its own superheroes? Or are all the movies superhero movies, with nothing made about ordinary people? They've probably got The X-men filed under documentaries, and Spiderman III ran on the Biography Channel.
"Maybe a play? Or maybe just dinner that doesn't come from freezer to microwave to table."
--M. J. Young
"A play sounds nice. If my hunch about things here is right, it'll be much better than anything we've ever seen, as long as the actors are decent and they're performing a play that was written in Northgate."
Indeed, critics often comment that plays written and performed in Northgate are superb in Northgate, but that the actors are never as good when they tour other cities and the plays prove extremely difficult to perform by other companies. So you can only enjoy a Northgate play in Northgate, really.
Musical, comedy, drama? What sort of play would you like to watch?
--M. J. Young
Oh, I certainly defer to her wisdom. She was, after all, an art major.
"Not that kind of art"
=P
It's still up to her
Mariska decides that a musical is apt to display the talents of Northgate best, and it seems she is correct. The play is written by a Northgate playwright, and is incredibly subtle in its humor, poignant in its drama, and its song and dance routines, which are seamlessly integrated into the story to the point that they feel like real life, have a complexity which baffles the mind as to how anyone could either sing or dance those parts, nevermind doing both at once. The small orchestral accompaniment is not only flawless, it is innovative and fresh.
What is most surprising is that the audience never gives any part of the performance nor the whole more than a nominal ovation. The few people who seem impressed have the marks of tourists from beyond the Northgate area.
--M. J. Young
I will enjoy it, but I won't clap or show my appreciation. People don't generally give me the credit I deserve, either.
After the play, people file out of the theatre, chatting about how it was the kind of play you expect from this team and they were quite adequate in their performance.
As the crowd begins to disperse, suddenly some one screams--more like squeals, in a startled sort of way--and there's a young man in a ski mask running across the street carrying a pocket book.
--M. J. Young
Get in Gazuntite; I trust I've got my stick in my hand, so I'll hand my bag off to Mariska and Great Jump to try to get ahead of this guy.
You easily fall into style and in seconds are standing mere feet in front of this charging purse snatcher.
--M. J. Young
Huh. Well, that was easy.
Try to use my disarm skill.
The thief is not carrying a visible weapon, so I'm assuming you are using the disarm skill to take the pocketbook.
You knock the pocketbook from his hand into the air, and catch it as it arcs to you.
Your adversary is clearly surprised, and is weaving and glancing all directions looking for a way of escape.
--M. J. Young
I brandish my bo stick at him.
"Run," I growl.
What are you hoping or fearing--that he runs, grovels, faints, attacks?
--M. J. Young
Fearing?
Well, a group of highly intelligent homosexual verser dragons--
The worst fear would be this becoming a high-profile event, reporters or paprazzi taking pictures, because I'm in a normal school and don't want to end up being transferred in with the supers; thus, someone who might recognize me and have the ability to tell the school board I'm a super would be bad.
Good would be if he either runs away or trips and falls or passes out. If he stands to fight I intend to use improvise martial weapon and beat him with the purse.
He turns toward the street and dashes out into traffic. Horns blare and tires squeal--and a winged man swoops down and grabs him, carrying him to the opposite sidewalk.
The would-be purse snatcher is being lectured by his rescuer, and is trying to glance back toward you but getting scolded for inattention when he does so.
The woman is thanking you for retrieving her purse.
--M. J. Young
Return the purse, then call out, "Hey, Icarus, is that you?"
Walk up to him, presuming that's who it is; we've met.
§
1. Daedalus told him about the encounters the two of us had, and he came to meet Mariska and I near the Daedalus Corp building.
2. He had a thing for Mariska, flirted with her, but he was kind of flying too close to the sun with that and ended up crashing and burning at the time.
3. He's one of the few people in the city who knows of my super-secret superhero name, "The Interminable Inconvenience."
Icarus's previous appearances:
Kyler in a New City, The online game continues
Page 6, posts 113 - 117
Page 15, posts 281 - 283
(Post 281 actually has my favorite line in it, which was my sig line up til we didn't have them anymore: "You don't hit the third all that solidy -- he's not dead, just wondering whether he will ever walk again.")
§
If it's not him, I guess I'll know soon enough.
It is indeed Icarus.
"Aye aye," he replies, or is that I, I? "Is this jaywalker one of yours?"
You cross the street with care while conversing, and his volume declines appropriately. Mariska follows.
"It's good to see you, again," Icarus says to Mariska.
--M. J. Young
I tell him, "Not a jaywalker, a purse-snatcher. The purse is back in its rightful hands, though, so you can change your lecture accordingly."
When he says hi to Mariska, I say, "Oh, ick."
Or is that, oh, Ic?
This was in the wrong space. I am that tired.
--M. J. Young
Yay, I'm special, I got a post and nobody else did =P
Mariska says, "Hey, I don't make disparaging comments when Kat flirts with you. Go easy on the guy--after all, how many eligible superwomen do you think there are in this town?"
You think Icarus blushed, but he is wearing a mask that covers part of his face.
"Don't mind him," she says to Icarus. "No matter how old my big brother gets, part of him will always be nine."
"Yes, well," Icarus stammers, looking for something witty to reply. "They say that about all boys, don't they? We never really do grow up, or else what girls expect us to be like when grown up isn't what being grown up is for boys. I mean--a look a bit childish myself, flying around and fighting evil."
--M. J. Young
I think to myself how it looks like I didn't have anything to worry about anyway, but I'm focusing my attention on the criminal purposefully.
"Well," Icarus says to you, "he's your catch, if you want to take him to the police."
--M. J. Young
I respond, "I'd already let him go, and karma was about to become his judge, jury, and executioner before you stepped in. He's your problem now."
"Fine with me, but I really only have him on jaywalking, so I'll let him go--unless your purse owner wants to come to the station and file a report?"
She has vanished in the crowd.
"You're lucky this time," Icarus says to the purse snatcher. "Don't press your luck."
--M. J. Young
Let the criminal run off to get a piano dropped on him or something; his karma will take care of him.
To Icarus, "I was thinking about the invitation you made to us, to fight crime, which I outright refused before. There really is a lot of bad stuff going on in this city; I was wondering if you had anything in mind when you were asking me, or if you were just generally trying to get me to pin myself down as a 'hero.'"
"Well--" Icarus hesitates, watching his jaywalker run off.
"We don't have any kind of organization of heroes or anything," he says. "I've suggested it to my dad once or twice, but you know how he is--or maybe you don't. He was trained by the KGB, you know, or something like that, and he's a bit paranoid about secrets. But Mentum and I sometimes go out together, watch each others' backs, that kind of thing, and I thought that if you were interested in the hero thing we might work together. I'm not embarrassed to admit that I get in over my head sometimes, and I've had to rely on help from others--and there are some pretty tough villains out there. I'm not sure I'm up to facing Toller alone, although fortunately he's been quiet of late so I haven't had to worry about that.
"That was really what I was thinking. Why, were you thinking something else?"
--M. J. Young
"No, that's what I figured you were thinking.
"You know, I've got some responsibilities during the week, but if you wanted to get together, I don't know, maybe this weekend, maybe we could find some heads to bang around."