Godlings' Day Out

[Ira]

Nimh had clasped Ira's hand as they walked out of the bathroom, standing her ground and confronting a strange man who inquired after their wellbeing. Nimh's response was a clear declaration of intent, but Ira saw no reason for this answer. Plebians such as this stranger mattered not to their objective, he could be ignored, right? His voice sounded familiar, and she couldn't remember if she had seen his face before... Was this someone Ira should've known?

Then it came to her. One word echoed in her mind. Cows.

Grabbing Nimh's hand even tighter, Ira declared, "NO! Nope no no no NOOOPE! No cows! [EXPLATIVE] That! No! My foot is down! Bears! Only bears!" And Ira pulled hard on Nimh, attempting to force the other girl to follow. To Ira's relief, she did, and they headed as a pair toward the front of the store.

The greeter, seeing Ira return, smiled and spoke to the two, "Welcome back to Build A Bear! I see you got your- sister? That's so sweet! Please, come over here, and let's choose a new friend for you two today!" She was a portly woman with poofy red hair, freckles, and a smile that seemed genuine despite a clear tiredness under her eyes. Ira decided she liked this woman and would not argue.

The woman lead the pair over to a large rack of limp, unstuffed animals. She started asking what kind they liked but Ira interrupted, "Bear, this one. No others. THIS BEAR." Her voice came out faster than normal and incredibly firm, Ira came in here as a child on a mission. She knew what she wanted. Make a plan, stick to the plan, get the bear. Picking up a little brown teddy with a pink nose, Ira looked at Nimh and asked, "Which for you?"

 

[illirica]

They were going to Build-A-Bear. Nimsy said the words like she expected to be challenged. She probably got that from Cait. Brian, who was at this point an expert in the matter of dealing with Cait and other stubborn subjects, knew when it was time to argue a point and when it was time to let it go.

"Sure." It was a relatively secure situation, it kept them occupied for a while, and it was much better than chasing them off somewhere, where they would inevitably try to build a bear or bear-like thing out of whatever came to hand, possibly flesh. Since Brian had no particular need or desire for an ursine flesh golem and Cait wasn't here to argue for it, he was perfectly content to follow the girls to Build-A-Bear so that the godbait could... diatribe about cows.

He tried not to be amused. The store worker gave him a questioning look, and he returned a roll of his eyes, a raising of a credit card, and the simple words: "God children." It wasn't many words, but it was enough for her to decide that he was there with the girls, as a sort-of-chaperone and most-relevantly, the one paying for the experience. Of course, he knew about Nimsy's little trick with the card reader - she might have gotten that from him, and he had several suggestions on how to improve it from a technological standpoint, but also this was not the time for that. His card was just a standard one, with the name Ewan MacGregor.

This usually prompted a stare, at which point he'd shrug in an understanding way, state: No relation, and that would be it - and then people wouldn't remember his face because their minds had supplanted it with whatever they thought Ewan MacGregor actually looked like, which was usually wrong. That was an L-6 trick.

He was observing the godbait's fervent devotion to a gutless bearskin when Cait rejoined him, handing him a paper to-go cup.

"I brought you overpriced pseudocoffee." It was his usual concoction of mint, mocha, sugar, cream, more sugar, more cream, whipped cream, and sugar. Brian had tried, very hard, back at L-6, to learn to like coffee. It had almost worked. It just needed enough other flavoring in it that it didn't taste like coffee.

"Thanks, I forgive you."

"Yay me. What for?"

"Don't know yet, but I'm sure there's something."

Cait giggled at that, doing a quick observation scan of the Build-A-Bear premises, sipping at her own coffee, which was just a latte without any add-ons, because she actually liked the taste of coffee.

"You wanna build one? They have cows."

"Ooooh, so you want to have a lot to forgive."