Electra

"Yeah, it's not like we don't have friends," Erin agreed, "but I'd kind of been hoping to meet more of the girls. Most of the people who came in this summer were guys, except me and Alex, and then Zoe. It's still pretty early in the year, though," she figured. She took a drink of her milkshake, studying him. "What do you think of Zoe so far?" she asked suddenly.

Stesha shrugged, pulling on her swim fins and flexing her toes a few times to make them wave around. "Oh, I don't know," she replied. "Just wondering if there were any that stood out to you as being really, really different. I mean, worlds like this are so close to Earth, and the Lor are kind of like humans, even if much more advanced. But there must be stuff out there that is far more different from anything we're used to."

"They're okay," she told him. "The first couple of weeks are mostly review anyway, so it's not bad. I didn't realize quite how much everyone coming back from the summer would already have their groups of friends set up, but it's just like any school, I guess. Kind of weird having so many people around all the time. I guess I don't like any of the classes so far, but I don't hate any of them either. Think we're going to keep up with group training during the year?"

"Hard to imagine," Erin decided. "Sometimes I feel weightless for just a quick second at the top of a leap, but that's it. You think the Freedom League does summer internship programs? It'd be kind of cool to spend a summer up on a space station, even if you were just making copies and doing computer stuff." She took a drink of her milkshake, looking around with less tactical purpose and more simple interest. "This place is nice," she decided. "It's quiet."

"My advisor specifically steered me away, so probably not," Erin said with a shrug. "The last thing I need is another term full of tutoring sessions. But if I get onto the League, I'll get up into space eventually. What's it like up there? Does it really feel like falling all the time? Could you see the Great Wall?" She picked up a chicken finger and ate it while she listened.

Erin's eyes widened. "He took you to space?" she asked, forgetting the plate of food for the moment. "The whole class? How did that work?" Though most of her friends were in that class, her advisor had told her it "wasn't a good fit" for her this year. She wasn't sure if that meant she wasn't doing well enough in science, or something else, but hadn't asked. "All we did in physics was watch a video of people bouncing around on a giant trampoline," she said with a bit of envy.

She laughed, the expression softening her whole face for a minute. "Guess so. I've always done it that way, probably because my dad did it. It's good, but if you do it wrong, your milkshake winds up full of crumbs. This is a good milkshake, too." She dunked the rest of the onion ring and ate it, thinking of something else to talk about. "How do you like your classes so far?"

"Well, they should've thought of that before they chased us into the sea!" Stesha replied, laughing as she ducked out of the tent and back into the bright morning light. "I might have been more persuaded to sneak along some leftovers for them." She hoisted the bag of towels and snorkel equipment and headed out barefoot across the white sand. The beach was small with the tide up, but that just meant less walking, to her way of thinking. Spreading her towel out on the narrow stretch of sand, she sat down and began sorting out her snorkel gear. "What's the strangest place you ever visited?" she asked.

Erin took an onion ring and dipped the edge of it in her milkshake before tasting it. "It's very good, "she agreed. "The school bakes too much of what should be fried. But there's always lots of food, and lots of fresh fruit and vegetables. I guess it's sort of like with your mom, healthy, but still okay." She smiled a little. "It's a lot better than I remember the cafeteria at my high school being. Maybe I'm just less picky than I used to be."

"Wouldn't your mom be really young to be getting Alzheimer's?" Erin asked. She didn't exactly know what gluten was or how one cut it out of the diet, but whole grains were generally not too good. "I guess even with a diet like that, though, you can still get a hamburger. How does the food at school compare?" She pulled a napkin out of the dispenser, folded it neatly next to her, and then absently began shredding it, her only real sign of discomfort at the moment.

"It's nice that she cares," Erin agreed. "And if food is that important, she probably really likes working at one of those organic places. There are a lot of places like that in Seattle, much more than around here, I think. It's probably just a west coast thing. We used to go to the Pike's Place Market, the place where they throw the fish around, on the weekends and buy all kinds of fresh food. What's her current thing?"

"Cruel to the cows?" Erin repeated, sounding a little incredulous. "I thought it was bad for them if they didn't get milked. Like they swelled up and it hurt or something. That's what I always heard, anyway. You'd think it would be better than getting made into hamburgers." She gave the inside of the restaurant the same sort of going-over she'd given the exterior, decided it was nonthreatening, and relaxed a little. "It's been a long time since I had a milkshake. I think I'll get one of those. Is your mom a vegetarian too?"

"Seeing the city from the sky would be cool," Erin agreed, "I only see it in little bits when I'm jumping around, and it's not exactly the same. It must be amazing when all the lights are on." She automatically oriented herself to land as they descended, settling to the ground next to him and once again trying to ignore the butterflies in her stomach. "It smells good," she commented, automatically looking around to check the lay of the land and get a feel for high points and escape routes. Just in case.

"Oh," Erin said, considering that. "I guess I probably kind of confused him then. I assumed he probably knew more than I tell most people, but then he acted really clueless, so I wondered. Not like I think you wouldn't keep a secret," she added, "but I thought maybe you might have, I dunno, coached him a little or something. Just to help him out."

Erin is throwing the first one to try and hit the ones who are stumbling, and the second one to hit the ones who are standing. With power attack, the save DC is 30, plus any bonuses you want to give her from the improvised weapons.

"It was fine," Erin replied after a thoughtful moment. "We only really played three innings before the fight simulation started, but it was fun. I want to try and figure out how to take the fight part out, so it's just the game. It was nice to play again, and he did really well for someone who's never played before. I think if there's an intramural team in the spring, he should go out for it." She bought a few moments by scraping the rust off the corner of one shelf before asking "I know you've told me a lot about him. Did you ever tell him anything about me?"

"Sounds great to me." She straightened up and gave him a smile he didn't quite understand. "We'd better get our suits on. Yours is still in the tent too, right?" Stesha headed into the tent, waiting for him to follow, then began changing, quite without regard to modesty. It seemed a little silly to worry about that at this late date. And even if it seemed a teeny bit mean, she liked making him stutter. She kept the necklace on, though. The chain was sturdy, and it matched her swimsuit, and she liked wearing it a lot. "And today I'll even try to keep from harassing the native wildlife."

"Do they know about you here?" she asked curiously. "I know you said it got around to some other parents in the neighborhood. It'll be funny when the kid they wouldn't let their kid play with is suddenly the local hero. Or even more than local if you join the League and do well." She surveyed the city as they flew overhead, starting to appreciate the high perch. "I figure maybe if I join up, they might give me a flying machine. That would be cool."

Stesha shook her head. "I know which end you're supposed to point at the bad guy, but that's about it. My parents didn't believe in gun ownership." She grinned. "If I got one in a fight, I'd probably just let one of my plants eat it, for safekeeping. Less dangerous for everyone that way. But you're probably right about knowing the basics." She looked over to Ace. "Can you teach us that sort of thing?"

Erin shrugged, the muscles in her shoulders and back tensing with the motion. "I don't even remember anymore, I was barely fourteen," she told him. "I wasn't thinking that far ahead. But the Erin here is me, or is me the way that I was and would've been. The League looked at my world and couldn't find any real divergence points before 2006. We might as well have been the same universe, until people got sick there and didn't here. Then it all broke off and things started going different from then on. She is me, the way I would've been if everything hadn't gone wrong." Knowing she'd derailed the conversation, Erin pursed her lips, forced a smile. "You should've asked her out, really. She's a lot better at this sort of thing than I am. Anyway..." She floundered for something else to say. "Do you go to this diner very often?"

"Somebody will melt it down into something," Erin agreed, giving her shelf a very quick and efficient scrubdown, then moving to the next. "I forgot to ask before, how did the thing with Mark's family go? Have they won the lottery six times or something like that?" She grinned as she started pulling more items off the shelves. "It would have to be weird to have someone in your family with that kind of luck. I can't even decide if it would be good or bad. But probably weird."

"Sports medicine, I guess," Erin said with a shrug, looking down over the city as they flew. It always felt a little weird to be neither rising nor falling, and not in control of her own trajectory. Mike was a good flyer, though, and if she concentrated hard, she could ignore the fact that he was holding onto her again. They'd done this before in training, how was this really any different? "She's what I would be like if I were normal, so apparently that's what I would've done. She doesn't study very hard, but her grades are fine, so she'll probably be able to do it. You could probably be a fireman if you wanted to," she added. "They'd make you for a metahuman, but who wouldn't want one on their team? You could replace a whole rescue truck all by yourself."

"It sounds like they have jobs they like, so that's pretty cool," Erin offered. "Not everyone probably wants an exciting job. It might be nice to work in a store you really like and have the same people come in every day. You'd probably get to know their families and make a lot of friends that way." She sounded vaguely wistful about the idea. "The Erin here is going into sports medicine, that might be neat, for the same reasons. Hero work doesn't seem like it lets you get to know a lot of people." She thought for a moment, glancing over at him. "If you were normal, what would you do?"

"They're not supposed to be necessary," she teased lightly, lifting her fingers to touch the stone. "That's what makes the best presents!" Chuckling, she finished up her sandwich and cake, then stood to stretch her muscles in the light of the rising suns. "So, what'll it be this morning?" she asked, bending her knee and lunging forward, then stretching to wrap her hands around her ankle. "You're picking this time, whatever you want."

"I don't know what half this stuff even does, besides irradiate me," Erin pointed out, grimacing over a chewed-up set of technical manuals peppered with mouse droppings. "But those binoculars might be cool. I know how to work those." She tossed the books into the garbage bin and started wiping down the shelf. "Maybe you could set up a table at school," she suggested, "sell them just before exam time to students looking for an edge in their simulations. When they cant', you know, get Edge in on their simulations."