Learning Curve [Balendin]

[zenobia]

Two weeks ago, Bale (that's what she called the not so scary man in her head voice now) had decided that it was high time that she returned to school. It's where little girls belonged, he'd told her. Zenobia hadn't wanted to go, but she'd remained silent on the way over, fiddling with the hem of her new dress as they walked. They'd been on longer walks back when the scary men were still chasing them with their guns, before Bale had told her to hide and gone to take care of them but, even so, her legs ached by the time they reached the white washed brick building with it's colorful overhang and fenced in yard.

It wasn't until he didn't come back for her the second night that she began to panic. It wasn't the first time that he'd left her alone, but she'd had Kitty and Fluffy with her then, and they'd curled up with her under the stars until he'd come to collect her, and it had been easy to be brave.

The teacher didn't like it when she brought Kitty and Fluffy out. She would tell Zenobia, in what the girl came to think of as her angry voice, that pokemon were not to be released in doors, that they disrupted the flow of classroom activities. Maybe she hoped that making Zenobia mad would draw sound from her lips, but she remained resolutely silent, her eyes downcast and bright with tears that never fell, and when she was called upon to answer a question, her silence held.

Silence, she lived in it, reveled in it, and hated it. She wanted so badly to tell them that she needed Kitty and Fluffy, that they made her feel safe when Bale wasn't around to scare all of the bad things away. She wanted to tell the other students that she didn't hate them, but she was afraid to make everything come tumbling down. She didn't want them to go to heaven the way her parents had, even if Tommy kicked at her chair during quiet reading and Lorelei called her mean names because she wouldn't talk to her. Lorelei was always talking, telling stories about her parents and their big house with the pool and all of the servants who did things for them. It was hard to imagine a life like that, especially now.

As far as Zenobia was concerned, life was a thing lived under trees and stars, in tents and in caves, and all the hidden places where the bad men couldn't find her. Life was a big coat used as a blanket, and Kitty's head on her stomach, and Bale's voice telling her for the 'fifth and final time' to go to sleep.

She missed Bale. He didn't hate her when she didn't talk, or call her stupid, or make her put Kitty away.

[balendin]

A red coated man sat on top of a parked hoverbike with a sidecar across the street from one of Celedon's best private elementary schools. Honestly, Balendin did not see what was so special about it besides the fact that a bunch of spoiled rich kids attended it. Of course, he had spoken to many so called expert in the field of education and they had assured him that his school would be the best place for his Zenobia to flourish. Even more so since apparently they were known to be able to accommodate those with disabilities. Disability! How he fumed when people said that word when talking about Zenobia. Not talking was not a disability. Zenobia could damn well decide to not talk if that is what she wanted.

The Lux Vice President had not told his young ward he was coming to pick her up after school today. He himself had not planned on it to be honest. He had been watching in on a Lux interrogation through a one way mirror. The man being interrogated was one of the constantly sprouting up Lux traitors amongst Lux rich and powerful. The rich were always looking to cut deals with Lux enemies if it meant they could line their pockets more. The interrogator had tried the age old tactic of threatening the man's family. Balendin himself found such a tactic disgusting by unfortunately at times necessary. The interrogator had held up a picture of the man's daughter and, to Balendin's surprise, his own Zenobia was in the background. Apparently the man's daughter, Lorelei, was in his ward's class.

His thoughts began to wander to what the young silent girl had been up too. He was a busy man and had little time to spend with her. Mostly he would just contact her nanny and find out how she was doing. Apparently she was having problems at school bringing out her pokemon at inappropriate times. Maybe she should not have given her that Altaria. She was young and having a pokemon with such power in her untrained hands could be dangerous to her and those around her. Maybe he would have a talk with her and maybe he would not. Despite his love of rules and discipline, he rarely had the heart to discipline this little girl.

Balendin continued to wait on his hoverbike trying to not bring attention to himself. Zenobia should be done with school any minute.

[zenobia]

It was nap time, and all she could think about was how much she wanted to go home. Not that she had a home anymore, strictly speaking. Home was wherever she and Bale happened to stop for the night. There'd been a house in there at some point, but it hadn't really felt like a home. There hadn't been enough pretty things on the walls, or stuff to sit on, and it'd felt lonely, as though people just stopped by sometimes and moved on instead of actually living there like they were supposed. Of course, that's what they'd done too: stopped by, stayed for a few days, and left. Zeno had wanted to put the dream catcher with the fluffy brown and white feathers in the room that was briefly hers, but they left before she had a chance, so she kept it in her pack instead, and now it lay in her cubby. She wondered if it was lonely there, she even asked the teacher about it, but the woman told her in her 'annoyed teacher voice' that a dream catcher was an objects and objects couldn't feel. Zeno wondered if her teacher could feel.

During recess she took the dream catcher and spun it back and forth between her fingers, delighting in the way the little beads attached to the twine sparkled as they turned beneath the harsh florescent lights - sometimes pink, sometimes gold. The dream catcher was the prettiest thing she owned now, made doubly special because Bale had bought it for her one day at a shop when he'd caught her staring at it. She hadn't needed to ask, and she thanked him not with words, but with her joy, spending the entire trip home spinning it back and forth.

When recess ended, they were told to put their toys away. The dream catcher was not a toy, it was one of her protectors, just like Fluffy. Bale had said that it would snatch up all of the bad dreams and keep them from away from her at night. Zeno kept on spinning the dream catcher right up until the teacher came and took it away. She hated the teacher, and she hated knowing that, when the day ended and some of the kids got to go home, she would have to stay with her teacher and the other teachers (who didn't seem much better). She'd heard the word 'boarding school' used a few times, but she wasn't really sure what it meant beyond not being able to go home. Had Bale given her away? Anthony said that his mother had given him away. Adoption, the teacher had called it when she'd overheard him talking. Zenobia decided that she didn't like that word.

They had a room for in the side building and everything but, unlike the other children, Zenobia refused to decorate her side of the room. You only decorated places that were your home, and she refused to call this place home, so the dream catcher remained in her cubby in the school building, and she hid all of her drawings under her mattress instead of taping them to the walls the way the other kids did. She knew that, come the end of the day, they would send her back to the room that was not quite hers, along with Amy, and Annette, and Lorelei, who also stayed there...except today they didn't. Today they let her go out the front door, the ways kids went when their parents were coming to pick them up at the end of the day. Her heart beat hard in her chest as she ran out the door and stopped at the top of the stairs. Three stairs and a parking lot were all that separated her from Bale. She let out a squeal of delight and darted down the stairs before the teacher could tell her to wait, or walk, or whatever it was that teachers said in front of parent in order to make themselves look good and the kids look bad.

She was across the parking lot in record time, moving as fast as her little legs could carry her, a single word upon her lips, forcing it's way out in an excited squeal before she could think to stop herself. "Bale!" Her first word in a little over a year.

[balendin]

The old sentinel's eyes scanned the small park that he was parked beside. It was well maintained and a number of people walked through going about their business. There was nothing out of the ordinary about it except for one thing. There was a middle aged man sitting on a bench facing towards the exit of the elementary school across the street. He wore black sunglasses despite the fact that it was fairly overcast today. He seemed to be watching the direction the kids would exit the school. The man continued to stare in that direction as kids began to exit the school. Balendin's paranoid mind could not help imagine that this man was some sort of pedophile staking out the school in hopes of snatching up one of the children. Suddenly the man stood up, taking a white cane into his hand that Balendin had not noticed originally. The blind man began to walk away.

"Bale!" said a sort of high pitched voice.

Balendin did not immediately turn his head to the sound although he noted it. That was a nickname some of his brothers and sisters used to use for him when he was a kid. As such, no one had called him by it since his last visit home which would have been when he had returned from the war, at least a good 20 years ago if not more. It was uncommon to find others called by it.

The vice president finally turned his head after having determined with high probability that the blind man really was what he appeared to be. He was surprised to see Zenobia nearly to him apparently having run the whole way. Balendin glanced around seeing if he could catch sight of whoever apparently shared a similar namesake to him. Finally he put two and two together. Zenobia had spoken.

At that moment a rare occurrence happened. The old sentinel smiled. Balendin found himself overcome with a strange joy; something he had not felt in a long time. He let out a laugh. It sounded strange to his ears for he could not remember the last time he had done that.

"You can talk! I told those bastards you could."

Balendin realized that there were people around and regained his composure. He reached out handing a child sized helmet he kept in the sidecar to his ward.

"Should we get ice cream or something to celebrate?" he questioned wondering if he could prompt her to speak again.