Sophie gingerly makes her way downstairs to the dining room, where she will be able to have a break from her studies with Alenia. Correcting her lack of suitable tuition she's calling it, torture would be a better term in Sophie's opinion. It all started because of their visit to the Science Museum, where she found herself bored out of her mind. So now Alenia is teaching her about all the things that she thinks she should have been taught growing up, including math, philosophy, and crafting. There she finds her father, who glances over her shoulder before cringing away from her.
"Come on Sophie, while you're having a break we can teach you how to cook. After all you will need to be able to provide for yourself."
Sophie sighs, "Alenia, can't I just do something fun for a bit?"
The skull floats over her shoulder to bob in front of her face, "What do you think?"
"I…I don't know. Maybe."
"Well, while you're deciding, let's start cooking."
Sophie is reluctantly walking into the kitchen when she stops as what Alenia said clicks in her head, "No," she says in a soft voice, "I'm going to the realm of magic."
After she triggers her Glimmerstone, Alenia sighs, "Finally." Before she pulls on the connection between the two of them in order to teleport to Sophie's side.
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Harry looks up from his painting as Hermione walks into the Glimmerstone house, "Hey Hermione, I was feeling a little sad earlier today, so I decided to paint it out. What do you think?"
Hermione smiles as she looks at the painting, "I think it will look good when it's finished. When did you start painting?"
"Yesterday, I was bored and decided to look through the available aspirations. I picked out Painter Extraordinaire as it seemed quite simple to do. I won't show you my first paintings, as they looked more than a little childish. But my latest ones are ok. This is the first time I've had the option to paint an emotional painting though."
"I'm so jealous of you, you can try all of these things whenever you want. I have to persuade Xing to bring me here if I've already used my stone once."
Harry nods, "I get it, I'm just not sure why you need to use the stone more than once a day."
Hermione flushes slightly, "I sometimes get up early so that I can get a few hours in the library before mum and dad want to do whatever for the day. I head home at around 9 on those days, and Xing's so interested in our world that I don't want to take her from it."
"Hang on, aren't you all still in France?"
Hermione nods, "We are, but we go there every year so I've done most of the stuff in the area."
Harry shakes his head, "What about today?"
"They're doing the museums, so I begged off and said I'd come and see you today. I'm glad you're home."
"Well, as you're here, you could do some activities with me. Let's see, do you like parfait?"
"Um, yeah, sure?"
"Great, then we can cook a Fruit and Yogurt Parfait together. Here we go, just relax and enjoy the experience."
"Harry, what do yo… Harry!" Hermione's voice goes a little shrill as she starts to walk into the house, and to the kitchen.
Over the next 20 minutes, she blinks her eyes as tears stream down while her hands are not so skilfully chopping up strawberries. Her head feels like someone's taken an ice pick to it, and she's also somehow keeping conversation going in Simian.
As soon as Harry pours the ingredients into a large bowl, the headache disappears as though it was never there, and Harry smiles at her while he hands her a bowl.
"How was the experience of cooking with me?"
Hermione takes a spoonful of the parfait and fair sags against a counter it's so nice, "Well, I like the results. I think that's the best I can say. It was like an ice pick was put through my head while I was working with you."
Harry smiles, "Think of it this way, you've got enough of the nanite machines in you now that the system allowed you to join me in cooking."
It takes her a few minutes for that to settle into her thoughts, while she's eating the parfait, then she nods, "That's true, I guess it's worth the headache to find that out. But I didn't think you could command me like that."
Harry wobbles his hand from side to side, "I didn't command you, I used an option to cook with you. And as you were willing, it took you through the motions of doing so. What are the ingredients in a yogurt and fruit parfait?"
"Greek yogurt, granola, whatever fruit you want, and honey. Wait, how did I know that?" Hermione's eyes narrow, "Harry, can we make that again please?"
Harry sighs, even as he smiles and triggers the activity again. This time, the headache is mild enough that Hermione can keep up her own conversation. At the end of it, Hermione jumps Harry in a hug.
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Sally-Anne smiles nervously at the people in front of her. The place she's in is very familiar to her, as it's where she's done her physiotherapy and had her new legs fitted.
"Erm, hi everyone. I just wanted to show you my new leg, it's a cutting edge prosthetic that requires a couple of surgical implants to work. Um, the leg itself can be removed, though the company that designed it say that it doesn't need it."
Dr Dormer steps forward, "You've probably seen us putting Sally-Anne through some tests including on the treadmill. Wherever she got the leg, it is bleeding edge technology. From what we can tell, it may be as a real leg."
Sally-Anne nods, "I've got a spare standard leg, just in case it breaks down. I've been asked to hand out a few pamphlets as they are looking for another six volunteers to receive free treatment." Cringing back as several people start talking at once, she holds up a handful of pamphlets as a shield, "Before you all jump at the chance, you'll need to consider that they want one of each pair to live near to the hospital for one year while they will be trying to come up with a way to perform the surgery in London for the other person. The whole thing is in the leaflets here, um, Dr Dormer, I think I should hand these to you."
Quickly, she hands the pamphlets over to the doctor before hiding behind Shenjing.