Shades of the Present|Sensatiamens, Sensatia

[Northen Light36]

Flame chewed absent-mindedly on a nail as she walked down the hallway - a nervous habit that had replaced her former one of thumb sucking. She didn't want to bother her parents while they were reuniting, she didn't have anything important enough to bother them with, but she didn't want to be alone either.

After a moment, she decided to seek out her brother. "Libre?" she asked quietly when she found him. "Can I stay with you for a bit, please?" Her finger returned to her mouth as soon as she'd spoken.

[Kender Bard]

"Sure," Libre agreed easily. He was sitting in a chair near his bed but with his feet propped up with a kind of lazy casualness his father never displayed. He marked his place in the book he was reading and tossed it on top of a large and haphazard pile. Smiling, he moved his feet off the bed and leaned forward. "Did you want to do anything?"

[Northen Light36]

Flame shook her head silently and moved to sit on the bed. Taking her finger out of her mouth (and revealing she'd chewed on the nail until it was nearly down to the pink part), Flame murmured, "I just wanted to be with you." The finger went back into her mouth.

[Kender Bard]

"Why do you do that, Flame?" Libre asked, trying not to grimace at the ragged nail, or lack thereof. "I mean, it's better than sucking your thumb, I guess, but why have something in your mouth at all?"

[Northen Light36]

Flame shrugged, taking her finger out of her mouth to examine the nail thoughtfully. "I don't know, I can't help it," she replied. "It just makes me feel better." She started to return the finger to her mouth, then glanced at Libre and visibly made an effort to rest her hand on the bed instead. "What are you reading?"

[Kender Bard]

"Mm history book," Libre replied, rubbing one of his eyes. "Interesting but a little wearisome. I could use with a break and I'm sure you didn't come in here to watch me read. Want to go for a walk around Senvasa? Or just around here?"

[Northen Light36]

"Senvasa," Flame said after a second of thought. "Can you teleport with me? I don't know it well enough to go on my own yet." The finger crept back up to her mouth, unnoticed. There was clearly something bothering the little girl, though she didn't look sad, angry or frightened, just unsettled.

[Kender Bard]

Libre frowned slightly. "All right," he agreed, standing and holding out his hand to her as he touched his sign and muttered. In a heartbeat, they were standing in the village square of Senvasa. Nobody looked at them twice; people teleporting in and out of the place was commonplace enough, even in the farming village. Still holding her hand, he set off to wander in an aimless direction. "So. Flame. Anything you want to talk about?"

[Northen Light36]

Flame shook her head, taking her finger out of her mouth just long enough to mumble, "Not yet."

As they walked around, Flame seemed to be trying to take in every detail of the village, almost as though she'd never seen it before or was looking for something in particular. After awhile she gave a frustrated sigh and muttered, "It wasn't here." Looking up at her brother, Flame admitted, "I had a foresight vision again. I think."

[Kender Bard]

Libre cocked his head at that. "Well then, why didn't you say so? Tell me what it was and I'll try to help puzzle it out." He assumed it wasn't an emergency or else she surely would have gone to their father with it or at least she would have been a little frantic over it.

[Northen Light36]

"Cause it didn't make any sense," Flame muttered. "I was little again, and cold. I was sitting on some grass watching other kids playing and I wanted to play too, but they kept looking at me funny, like I shouldn't be there. And then a man picked me up and I was happy, but kinda nervous of him." Flame shook her head. "It wasn't scary, like when Daddy was attacked, but it felt really, really wrong. And I don't know why."

[Kender Bard]

"If you were little again then I don't think it was the kind of vision of the present or the future," Libre replied. "You know..." He frowned thoughtfully. "There are actually people who get visions of the past. But it's very, very rare. Usually you need to touch something or someone and you don't have a lot of control over what you see." He gave her a thoughtful look. "The only other explanation I can think of is that you were having a vision of the now like you did before, but you were seeing something from the eyes of a kid from around here, maybe."

[Northen Light36]

Flame shook her head. "I don't think it was the past," she murmured thoughtfully. "I don't know why, I just think it wasn't. It felt too wrong and important, I guess. I don't think it was really me who was little." She hesitated, then asked, "Can I try and show you what I saw, Libre? That might be better then words."

[Kender Bard]

"All right," Libre agreed. "But let's sit down so we can concentrate." Unlike Sensatiamens, there weren't picturesque little benches placed to take advantage of the scenery and Libre wound up wandering around until he found a large bounder off the side of the road. He sat down on part of it. "All right. Project your memory at me."

[Northen Light36]

Flame sat next to her brother and closed her eyes, touching her sign and chanting softly as she projected at her brother.

At first there was nothing to see, except the reddish darkness of screwing your eyes tightly shut. There was plenty to feel though. Cold, mild fear, loneliness and under that a childish and only half understood sense of loss. The person who's mind Flame was sharing opened her eyes and looked out at a group of children. "Can I-" the little girl cut herself off as the other children turned to look at her coldly, then as one turned away again.

The little girl sighed and looked down at the grass she was sitting on. Too green she thought sadly, running a small hand through it. She was dark in colouring, darker then Flame had been at that age. Her skintone hinted at a mixed heritage, possibly a native Naurite parent and a parent from elsewhere, and there was a fire sign visible on the back of it.

The sound of footsteps approaching made the little girl look up. A man with red hair and blue eyes was approaching. He was giving the little girl a warm smile, but the child still felt a sense of both unease and uncertainity alongside a sense of liking. "There you are," the man remarked. "Silly girl, you shouldn't wander off. You could get lost." He bent to pick the child up and added, "Come on, your mother's worried about you. I'll take you home."

The vision faded back to black then, endding with a faint but pressing since of importance and wrongness.

Flame stopped projecting then, but kept her eyes closed. "What do you think?"