Backwoods
21: Family
Upon his awakening the next morning, Torner's tracker beeps in a flurry of fun notification, as flipping fireworks. Groggy and irritated, rubbing his temple, the thirteen-year-old scrolls through his messages, and it takes him three tries before he notices the pattern: each one is from the exact same sender. He blinks, blearily, his brow furrowed, before groaning into his pillow. Ruby Bling can go leave him alone.
Maybe, maybe she thinks cuz he's thirteen, he's all malleable and stuff, and if she just keeps freaking working at it, she'll seduce him, or whatever. Ewwww. Girls are still low-key gross, like, kissing? No. Oh no. Come on. Plus she's weird, and Torner doesn't like her, and she probably has a heart beneath all of her lust for money, but it's not like Torner's paying any attention to that, now is he? What about the diary? The diary she may not even own!
Throat-clearing by his ear. Torner moans. I've raised you better than that, you.
He pouts, embracing the fact that he is still an utter child. But I'm mad, cuz this dumb girl is terrorizing me. It occurs to him to send a complaint up to one of the chief wardens, but it also occurs to him that they have too much going on trying to stop Stryker's crazy expenditures and also not go bankrupt to focus on Torner's pathetic love life.
Aw, darn. Wait—
Recalling his plan for a farce, all in the world is good again. Torner releases a long, long breath. Okay. Now to make magic happen.
What happens when she falls in love with someone else?
Torner scowls. Wh-What about it, Lysandre? W-We just have to pretend f-for now! Then Ruby'll stop being mean and go prey on some other unsuspecting scrub. Or maybe by then he'll have an actual girlf—pffff who is he kidding, no he won't.
You should just ask Mei Lan out, fall in love, live a happy life with her.
An angry flush fills his cheeks. No I shouldn't. She's mean too. Every single girl is mean except for the ones who are already taken, plus this one.
Oh that is just not true, Torner. Stop moping. You're only thirteen, remember that.
In favor of ignoring his lythro, Torner goes back to the messages he got from Ruby. He scrolls all the way down to the bottom and opens that first one. Invitation for "Midell Brunch" received. He groans a second time. That sounds fancy... does he own a single scrap of fancy clothing...
Wait his guardians own a clothing shop, of course he freaking does.
Somehow that makes it worse, because it means he has to go now. O-Or at least, there's not much of a reason not to.
Instead of replying, Torner stalls by reading through all the other texts he got. Ruby's voice continually blows up in his head, things about fancy gatherin' and you should come and blah blah blah this is as boring as going to the bathroom.
Ahhh, just try it, Torner. If you give in this once, and prove yourself unwavering, she might leave you alone.
He suddenly jumps up from his bed, dragging the blankets and a certain lythro along with him. She teeters over and lands in a pile of unwashed underwear. Lysandre! I've got it! I'll spill grape juice all over her, and then she'll hate me for the rest of eternity!
That's not... His lythro snorts, raising herself again. She lacks the care to comment upon her boy-warden's inability to do his own laundry, in the interest of pursuing her original request. Don't be so childish, Torner, or you never will truly grow up.
Torner considers fighting that claim, but the more he thinks about it, the worse he sees the conversation turning out, so he leaves it as is.
A bedhead boy wanders off into his closet, bumping his head on the door frame before making it all the way in. Steadily, as he seeps through his mess of clothing, most unwashed, a rainbow sea of Torner-smelling decay expands. Eventually he resurfaces in a pink-flamingo hawaiian shirt, actual jeans, his weirdly immaculate pair of boots, and a tie that is the opposite of tied.
Maybe we should go find Nate. I'd say he knows how to tie a—
Torner raises a hand. I'm thinking, if I go in like this, then—
Torner oh my goodness you are not listening to a single thing I've said. Growling under her breath, Lysandre glances hopelessly at the two vivosaurs still asleep in Torner's bed as if for an unwilling reinforcement. Do you even know how to enjoy yourself if you're not playing video games? Is that the one thing in your entire life that makes you happy, or something? Torner!
He stiffens. Brushes some of the wrinkles out of his shirt.
His vivosaur's usually calming ambery-green gaze has unsettled. Torner, there is so much more to life than a screen with funny characters that aren't even real dancing around on top of it! Slowly unwinding, her unsettled eyes submerge within a storm. Before you go complaining about your terminally absent brother, look at yourself and do something about it! How do you know you're not one of the reasons he decided to leave! The storm devolves, and devolves, until finally a maelstrom seethes in its wake.
Lysandre straightens, as if to add something else, only she catches her fighter's lip trembling and releases it, whatever it is. Torner... And now he's crying. Wonderful. Dhhh—Torner, I wasn't trying to... She thinks back upon what she was saying. Okay, maybe she went a little too far. That Hanzo thing was a... yeah that was too far.
He still won't meet her gaze, but he mumbles, You're the best mom I ever had, and that makes me really really hate you sometimes. She winces. He continues. It just... cuz like, you know, I'm not... I'm all not decent at all, so then you're like trying to get me to be all good, except that won't work, and then I'm... I'm like a scrub... and I can't even win at ARMS and Stryker thinks I'm good at being a warden... but I'm not good at anything...
After letting out a slow, relieved breath, Lysandre decides to be at least grateful that her fighter is no longer crying due specifically to her. She clears her throat. I'm not going to pity you, Torner. As I've said before, you are only thirteen. Please... chill out.
Her eyes wander. Torner's follow. Well this is a smidge awkward. And, ah, finish getting dressed? I-I mean the breakfast thing probably already started, so you might as well get there sometime within the next year. Maybe they have, I don't know... what was it you liked? The flat, bready food. And you'd drown it in liquid sugar, that brown stuff.
As if in response, Torner presses his lips tightly together. He doesn't even make anything out of it, just stands there, staring at the same corner in the room, the tie around his neck steadily drooping until it finally slips onto the floor.
Dejected, Torner stares down at it. It's not a shabby tie: crisp, white, with tiny paisleys on it. But there it is. On the floor. D'you think they'd notice if I just didn't wear a tie? I mean I'm already dressed fine. The flamingos, I think, are what sells it.
The flamingos, I think—Lysandre breaks off to snort loudly—are atrociously extra.
Yeah well you don't even wear clothes so your opinion doesn't, like, count. Torner sticks out his tongue at her, and their relationship goes pretty much to the place it always goes to. And she does—Lysandre does—consider it, apologizing, but she leaves it as is. If she apologized, it'd be like saying the reason behind her raising her voice was invalid, and they both know that's not the case.
Well thank goodness Torner's not as weak as he looks and acts, huh?
The fighter in question takes a long stare at his sleeping vivosaurs: the red-and-green monstrosity and also Gremaine. He grunts, opens up his hand; Lysandre's tidy scarlet-rimmed medal falls neatly into his palm. Warm and soft, a reminder. He tucks it safe within his jeans pocket, then raises his head slowly, looking literally the freshest he has possibly ever looked. The only time that might compare is when he went to that going-away party his guardians threw for Hanzo and Sasuke after they had already disappeared for their ninja whatever training.
That's not that pathetic, is it?
From his pocket, a speck of light hums. I was joking about the flamingos. You look fine, Torner. Maybe you'll snag yourself one of those girlfriends you want so badly if you dress like this all the time.
Oh ha ha, he mutters. I'm not dating a girl who makes me put this much effort into my outfit every single day of my life.
That's not exactly what I meant, the warmth snickers. She lets it be, though.
Torner steps over his little wasted tie and off they go. Although his walk moves at the pace of a crippled shuffle and he takes a long, long breath before using the world gate portal thing, there unfortunately are not all that many steps between Regis and Midell, which sounds really messed up when you think about it for too long. They are on opposite ends of the world, after all, but anyways. The boy enters the castle-shaped warden headquarters and takes a stop to re-listen to Ruby's voiced directions before wandering aimlessly into a wall.
Finally Torner enters a giant chamber full of pointy chandeliers and long, manila tables.
Immediately he wishes he was stationed here. Freaking Violet takes so much better care of her headquarters than both Becky and Stryker combined. Even—Even though Becky has Sean and Stryker has Liu Ren.
What a mom.
Yeah, but moms are decidedly cool, Lysandre informs him, and Torner shrugs.
Wait—Torner remembers that Violet and Drake did adopt two kiddos, and he also remembers that one of them is Dahlia. His heart rate spikes until he recognizes zero Dahlias in the chamber. Thank goodness. For a second there he was like, does he need to run home and never leave his room again.
Then his mind glosses over the whole Dahlia's dad seems to ignore her existence thing and he doesn't know how to feel again, opting to swallow the strange dull taste in his mouth.
Nervously, as faces begin to turn his way, Torner runs a hand through his hair, tries for a wave, gets zero waves back—wait except for the sporadic one in the corner oh great that's Ruby. Man, despite the length of the tables, they sure are sparsely assorted with wardens. Like, not even Drake's here? Wait Drake hates being around people.
Ruby gives this giddy little laugh. "Torner!" she tosses with a final waggle of her hand, "how splendid it is of you to join our little gathering here! My my..." She purrs a little too excitedly to herself, twirling the end of her braided hair. Oh geez are there rubies, like, weaved into her braid. Oh geez. Her actual hair must cost as much as his NS. Or more. "Usually, only the best of the wardens are allowed to dine here, but Sapphy's one of the best, so we get to come all the time~"
Torner never thought he'd be this grateful that Dahlia isn't one of the best. Curiously he scans the crowd of the... "best". There's a giant dude he recognizes as one of the band members from Red Fang, and beside him resides the man who sat next to Gauss on the piano for... Torner is literally never going to remember that name. Some fun, unfamiliar people swim before his gaze until Torner just plops himself down next to Ruby and can't look at them all anymore.
Hey this must be where Hanzo usually eats. Is this why Torner will sometimes not see him for weeks at a time.
Oh shoot.
Tethered by necessity to the lady who invited him, Torner stabs a glance Ruby's way. She's... in this really fluffy red dress, which is cute and all except for the part that it is sort of low-cut, making Torner very uncomfortable. "S-So who all's allowed here, a-anyways?"
"Mmmmh, the cooks, obviously. When they have time off they hang out in here sometimes." Ruby analyzes her freshly-painted silvery nails. Frowns at one of them, Torner can't tell why. "You probbbably haven't met them? There's a pretty cute girl on the team, name's Daisy, but I guess that wouldn't matter to you since you're in your fancy nancy stable relationship."
Is she trying to get Torner to... give up on his nonexistent girlfriend? D-Did she figure out that his girlfriend's nonexistent?
Ruby continues, none the wiser. Her amber eyes twinkle annoyingly like the glitter on her nails. "Who elllse... Oh! The ninja dudes, of course. Hanzo 'n Sasuke. Nnnfgh, I tried so hard and neither of them showed even the slightest bit of interest in me..." She sniffs. "I thought at least I'd at least win over that skanky Sasuke...
"Oh well, oh well. Ahhh, the music venue members are allowed in, since they're cool and all. Y'see the giant dude with the flaming red hair? That's Aggro, and the dude with him's Lancelot. Don't concern yourself trying to remember them though, because apparently they're too important to keep up with us normies."
A sudden new person plops down across from them, in a long... bathrobe, and pajama pants, and slippers, and her short sky-blue hair hasn't even been combed. Torner stares up at her in pained awe. "Ru, what are you talking about? Is this because neither of them were single when you asked them out? I told you, they've been dating for years now. You can't break up a happy couple to snag a hot man; they wouldn't let you, even if you were any good at it. Nor should they, you cretin."
Oh this is Sapphire. Torner remembers her by her totally dry, sarcastic tone. Somehow it's still thriving with this underlying regal tone, which is both confusing and... a little cute? But not cute, because she's old, as in adult old, as in way out of Torner's league.
Torner wants a girl like her though. The sort of girl who will go into a fancy nancy restaurant in pajamas.
Glancing between her sister and her sister's new buddy—over a heaping plate of cinnamon rolls and something Torner doesn't even know the name of—Sapphire smirks. She lacks the care to cover it with her hand. "Did you even show him where the food is? Ru, you're not gonna win over a guy like that."
"That's what you think," her sister mutters before grabbing Torner's wrist and pulling him toward the back of the chamber. A fat assortment of pleasant-smelling essentials stares up at him in rows of tables and helpings and, holy gosh food.
But wait. There's no pancakes. When Torner asks, his escort goes so far as to laugh a snooty laugh. "Pancakes? The only pancakes we have are the crap-ones Stryker makes with his watered down pancake mix! I mean, sure, sometimes the real cooks will whip something akin out, like their fancifully gorgeous crepes, but pancakes? Why pancakes when you can have something imported from Caliosteo? I mean how fancy is that?"
Torner shrinks into the pit of his pancake-loving soul and morosely dishes scrambled eggs onto his plate. A giant pile of scrambled eggs, the most unappetizing-looking bit of food hidden within the never-ending aisle of cuisine glory.
And then he drowns his eggs in ketchup and slowly waddles back to his table, leaving Ruby to silently tally which delicacy costs the most out of the bunch.
Sapphire, upon his return, glances down at his eggs and nods. "Sometimes I have those kinds of days too. I feel you, kiddo." She puts down her exquisite knife-looking thing and uses her fingers to pop a clump of cinnamon roll into her mouth. "Ru's annoying as all hell, but she's good in a pinch. Well... she's also bad in a pinch, but in the end I guess what matters is she's pretty ridiculous. Comedic relief! That's it, she's comedic relief." Sapphire smiles smugly to herself.
"Ha-Has she ever stolen your boyfriend, Sapphire?" Torner blurts.
"Pfffff, my boyfriend?" Sapphire slaps a hand onto the table. "Do I look like the type of person boys would just be leaping at the chance to date? Look at this, look at"—she points out a spot of her bathrobe to Torner and states, nimbly—"this coffee stain is from two weeks ago. Now I'm wearing it out in public."
"Yeah well I'd rather date a girl like you than a girl like Ruby," Torner also blurts. He realizes that he doesn't quite regret it.
Sapphire gives him this stare, like she can't tell if he's serious or not. "Honestly, you'd need parts of both of us in order to make a good girlfriend." And despite herself, she doesn't let Torner get away with making fun of her sister.
"So, uhhhmm..." Torner glances back at all the people in the room. They still make him feel weird, and Ruby never finished her gossiping about them. "Why do I recognize like none of these guys?"
"Because you're a little baby junior warden?" Sapphire rolls her hard, blue gaze. She kinda grins though, like she was waiting for a chance to gossip too. This is just wild. "Mmmh... The rockers are cute and all, but they mostly stick to their crowd. Uhhh..." Oh boy, more gossip. This is not really what Torner asked for, but too late, it seems, to knock her out of her people-watching reverie. "The warden heads, of course, get to come in and crash the place whenever they feel like it. And Mei Lan—well, until she snapped a chandelier in half, scared the living daylights out of Stryker. It was hysterical. I almost peed myself. Anyways, now she's on probation." Oh. Oops. Torner's not even surprised.
As if summoned by the sound of gossip, Ruby materializes with a plate of more food than Torner can stomach. He stares at it, and it causes his appetite to dwindle. "Oooooh, let's seeeee!" She turns around in her booth-chair subtly, the better to search the faces of the people around her. "Ah! Doctor Doug Digmore! They say he got his name from an old ancestor of his. No idea who, but. Anyways, he keeps getting attacked by vivosaurs on his little discovery missions, so he's a bit of a failure if you ask me. I thought about asking him out, but, y'know, even I have standards."
"No you don't," Sapphire interjects, "you asked him out and he dumped your sorry ass all quiet-like. He was all cute about it, too, like oh, I'm so sorry, I'm really too busy to be thinking about a relationship right now." She rolls her eyes. "Even he knew you were only doing it for the chance of breaching his little fortune. The ninjas are probably richer, you know." A telltale pause, and her eyes wander. "Sasuke... at least." She hesitates upon the name.
Ruby seethes and blusters all over her sister's soft words. "Yeah, but the ninjas already said no! I am still so peeved at stupid Sasuke shooting me down! Literally he told me one time he only does relationships for looks, doesn't pay any attention to a girl's personality—and he says no to me! I know he thinks I'm hot, I do, anyone can tell! So why—"
"It's obvious he was lying, Sapphire rushes to counter. "He wants to only care about a girl's body, so maybe he just accidentally fell in love or something? I dunno... I mean, falling in love is a smidge annoying since you get so attached to that person, and all."
Torner, trying to follow the conversation and failing, coughs. "W-Wouldn't it be funny if Sasuke'd fallen in love with your sister?"
A flinch spreads across Ruby's face, as it steadily loses all sense of color, who turns to her sister like she trusts Torner more than her.
Curiously, Sapphire goes a little quieter. "Wh-What? S-Stop looking at me like that, sis, I wouldn't do that. He's off limits, remember?"
"O-Off limi—"
"Of course you wouldn't get it." Sapphire fixates on her bathrobe, picking a speck of lint out of it. "We agreed not to steal a guy we both had interest in from each other. I mean, I guess it'd be fine for me to ask Sasuke out too, since Ruby already did, even though I told her I liked him, back before he turned out to be an ass, and all, but... still...
"Ugh, what are you, our little brother? I literally feel like you're our big-eyed little brother and this is the second time I've ever spoken to you." Instead of finishing that sentiment, Sapphire returns to her food.
Huffing, Ruby follows suit.
Torner already ate his eggs and now has no idea what to do. They were, uh, they were pretty good eggs. Not, uh, not bad. Not bad eggs. Uh.
Well now he knows so much dirt on the fancy nancy wardens. Isn't that funny? Man... He gets up for a second, lightheaded, and wanders back over to the food. Not because he's hungry, or anything, but...
He was right. Behind the food, in the wall, there's a gap where it all must get sent out. And to the side there's a door, which probably leads to the kitchens. Torner goes into the door like he works in the kitchens, and immediately he runs straight into a large fellow.
The large fellow jolts in place, pulling his giant cook's hat over his head, smoothing over his lacy apron. Torner stares at him, this large fellow with the cool disheveled brown hair and—the muscles! Geez, he's as ripped as a dude in ARMS.
Suddenly Torner is inspired, but he remembers that's not why he's here.
"Uh." He sort of... taps the large fellow. "D-Did you guys... make the eggs?"
The large fellow, large but quiet, murmurs, "Rocky," pressing a hand to his chest. "Rocky made eggs."
"Oh uh." His voice is so cool. He sounds like a wrestler. Torner tries very hard to contain his feelings. "Th-Thank you for making the eggs, Rocky."
This funny, cute smile addresses Rocky's thick face. "Welcome. Rocky got eggs from raptors. In garden! You no see garden? You see garden sometime. Nice, nice garden."
Torner nods incomprehensibly. He can't shake the realization that he's met an ARMS character in real life.
Then from the side approaches this girl around Torner's age. Short blonde hair around her face, soft blue eyes, greenish in the middle, little smile. "Hey there! Whatchu doin' back here? Yer, uh, technically not supposed to be here." She gives Rocky a hard glance. "Was it you? Did'ja let this stray in?"
"Maybe." Rocky makes a funny, cute giggle.
Wait Torner's a stray?
"Pshaw. Nah ya di'n't." The girl pulls up her sleeve and proffers a hand to Torner. "Name's Daisy! Rocks 'n I, we go way back. We work in the gardens together! But uh, but anyways, the plan is to get our wardens license while we're here, soooo, see ya round sometime?
Torner, staring at her hand, tentatively slaps it. She breaks into a huge smile and fist bumps him in the shoulder. "I like this feller. What's yer name, stray?
Feeling weirdly foreign, Torner mumbles some words that manage to string together in a faint recollection of his name. She nods all happily. "Well. I'll try'n remember that. I like yew, stray."
And they escort him out just like that. Wow. From his pocket, Lysandre brings to mind the fact that Torner literally just thanked someone he doesn't even know for making eggs, and that makes him feel weird, so he ignores it.
Daisy was nice though? Not like, wow, she's cute, nice, but just nice. Pleasant.
Maybe she'll be a warden someday. That'd be cool.
Okay no she's definitely cute though.
Man Stryker recruits wardens from literally everywhere. Elite agency? Pffffhh—Pshaw.
Upon returning to the table, Torner overhears the sisters bickering over some attractive man who always wears a mask, because Ruby bets if she dated him she'd see his face—and if she saw him she'd say he's hot, and Sapphire's like, you're never going to date him first of all, and second of all you have no idea whether he's hot or not.
And she likes Sasuke? Well, both of them, yeah, but Sapphire in particular. And she won't ask him out cuz of Ruby, and he won't ask her out because no idea. Because he's a scrub. He's related to Torner so he probably is one honestly.
Ruby beckons over to the thirteen-year-old, places her hand by his seat, asks him how he's doing, and all. He kind of... shakes his head, makes up an excuse about having to call his girlfriend, ducks on out of there.
Man. He keeps making friends with people, but then he also keeps meeting people who don't like him, or who he doesn't like. It's almost like he's playing a video game, except actually it's real life.
Lysandre breaks out into laughter from his pocket.
Finally, finding himself a nice alcove, Torner tunes into his tracker and scrolls through his contacts.
…
"Torner? What's... up?"
He's sitting on one of the bridges, at the edge, throwing rocks into one of the lotus ponds. He told her it's called Lantern Lake, and she pronounced it so cutely, because she pronounces everything so cutely.
She's trying to teach him how to skip rocks, but at some point he got bored. Now his head is on her shoulder, and she's very soft and warm.
From the other end of the world, tucked into his ear, his brother's voice fills him: "Okay, so, fun story, I maybe told Ruby I have a girlfriend. Now I need to find a girl who can pretend to be my girlfriend. I-I mean technically I said we'd been in an arranged marriage since childhood, but I figured I could make it work as long as I've got a pretend girlfriend."
Hanzo snorts. He murmurs, "Go on," the evening sunlight twinkling through the thick trees, leaving tiny pockets of bright color nestled within mottled shade. Duna, clutching a rock, tosses it and watches it skim once, twice, three times before not even sinking but landing on a bit of shoreline. Her eyes get all twinkly when she does it, and Hanzo asks her to do it again.
He likes watching her when she does something that makes her eyes all twinkly like that.
"Sooooo. I was thinking, since I don't know a lot of girls who are both date-able and single, I have to, uh, think fast."
"Okay." Hanzo stifles his snicker.
His brother swallows. "Wooooould it be okay if we pretend Duna's my girlfriend?' Dhh—Does he hear Hanzo's intake? "She doesn't hate me, ri-right? I-I mean I know she knows you better of course... b-but I'm your brother! So it's fine! I mean I dunno how long we'd pretend, maybe until I got an actual girlfriend, but...
Hanzo focuses on his breathing, his eyes shut, his body stiff. She feels it and she gently presses a hand to his shoulder. It feels nice, but...
"Ha-Hanzo? You still there?"
But...
"Y-Yeah. Yeah, I'm still here."
"Then why'd you get all quiet? Duna's been in stone for a zillion years! There's no way she likes anyone yet, right? Plus, the wardens are all weird, and...
His brother's not an idiot. "What's wrong?" Then it hits him. "Is she already dating someone? Bhhh—Who?"
Kind of oblivious though, his little brother. Hah.
Hanzo opens his eyes. He leans into his companion, his voice level.
"Me."
It's suddenly hard to breathe. Harder to breathe than it ever has been.
His brother squeaks. "You like someone?! You've literally never dated a single person before ever!"
"Yeah. I... I know." He stares into the lake. His reflection, and Duna's, stare back. "She's really cool though. I never met anyone as cool as her before. So I never... d-dated anyone. Before her."
Why is it so hard to say?
"Oh, um... ne-never mind then! I'll make Mei Lan do it or something! Ah-Ahaha...ha...
"Bro, why... didn't you tell me?"
Hanzo... straightens. "I don't know. We haven't told anyone else." He tries to remember how to breathe. "Uh... sorry."
"Ye-Yeah, well—" Without even letting himself finish, Torner's tracker disconnects.
Hanzo stares at the nothing in front of him.
Duna nudges him. "That was..."
"Torner. It was Torner. He..." A small, strange smile flickers over the ninja's face. "He wanted you to pretend to be his girlfriend, because he... told... the wrong person... that he had one."
"Pfff..." Politely, Duna covers her lips. "Wh-Why did he tell someone he had a girlfriend? That is a very sudden thing to... make-believe."
He can't look at her straight. Shakes his head, still smiling. "You're right. It is. He told this woman he has a girlfriend because this woman is very lonely, and she wants to live her life with someone else, a sentiment which scared my little brother. She also wants someone else who has money, for their money, so don't feel too bad for her, Duna. That part probably scared him too. Heh..." He lowers his gaze.
Duna, tucking her fingers under his chin, tilts his head up toward hers. Her scales, soft and blue, dance along his. The sensation of heat suffuses throughout his body, all from the tip of her finger. "Poor Torner..." Small laugh. "So he wished for me to be his girlfriend? But that did not end very well for him, because we...
She closes her eyes, letting out a low sigh. The lotus flowers in the pond stir in circles, brushed by the breeze. "He reminds me of... Dino, too. Y-You both do, a little. Ahaha... Only Dino could get himself cornered in such a predicament." She draws off, glimpses again the ninja's shy gaze. "You... do not... just remind me of Dino. Just... a little."
Hanzo nods at the water. His reflection wobbles, then flashes momentarily into a whirlpool of misguided color when he kicks a rock in through the head.
"I really... do like you, Hanzo."
"Y-Yeah. I know. Sorry, this is all very..." he grunts, returning to the dinaurian girl. "It's very new for me. I-I still feel weird. Never really thought I'd... end up..."
"Heh..." She gently tugs him into an embrace. Her chin digs into that niche between his shoulder and his head, and he exhales, the smile clutching his lips.
"But—um..." Hanzo remembers himself, remembers where he is, and he clasps the girl between his arms. "I should've told Torner. I think he feels like I'm avoiding him... I, ah, it's been some time since we saw each other. Before all of... this."
A small knowing smile blooms upon Duna's lips. "I know! We should go play video games with him! Ah—Ahaaah... he really loves video games..."
"Yeah, he... does, huh..." He rests his head against hers, threading a pale hand through her bright pink hair. "Hnn... that's not a bad idea. He'd... like it if we did that, I bet...
But just... a little longer. "I like... holding you... like this. S-Sorry if I'm really bad at it."
"Heh. You are fine, you are fine..."
But they do find Torner, and they do play video games with him, and they do make his brother's freaking day. Just... a little later.