Room 506, Wednesday Afternoon

[swordsandsoccer]

Dolf's classes had left him in a pretty good mood, which was a good thing; he'd been kind of mopey since the weekend, and it had been high time for him to get jolted out of it. As it turned out, Portalocity prices weren't that bad anyway. He'd just been focused on the whole 'plane' thing, and hadn't realised there were other alternatives

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[onlymistaken]

"Birds. In slingshots." That was Cally in the doorway, arms folded and smile half quizzical, half amused.

[swordsandsoccer]

"It wasn't my idea!" Dolf protested immediately from above his book. "It was just stuck that way!"

[onlymistaken]

"It was somebody's idea." Cally pushed off the doorframe and made her way inside. "Who thinks 'Hmm, target practice - oh, I know: we'll shoot some birds at pigs?'"

[swordsandsoccer]

"I don't know," Dolf said, sitting up on the bed. "It's wasting a lot of good food either way."

He still kind of wanted to know what those birds tasted like. Shh.

[onlymistaken]

"Do pigs really come in green?" Cally asked, walking over to sit beside him. "...Anywhere but here, obviously."

[swordsandsoccer]

"I have never heard of a green pig," Dolf informed her. He quickly shoved his book aside - shutting it first - so there'd be more space and... stuff.

For stuff.

And stuff.

"Unless it was really sick..."

[onlymistaken]

Oh look, more space for sliding closer. "Perhaps it's a good thing we didn't eat any of them, then."

[swordsandsoccer]

Oh look, that was Dolf, smiling. "Maybe," he admitted, "But if we had found pigs and birds together like that on the road, we would have eaten them even if they were blue with green spots."

[onlymistaken]

"Food ran low with that many people, I imagine?"

[swordsandsoccer]

"Hunting was hard sometimes," Dolf said, sliding his arm around her waist with practiced ease. Now, at least. "Lords didn't like it if you hunted on their land, and people doing so could wind up being killed or worse. And sometimes there wasn't space to fish."

[onlymistaken]

"Because you weren't near water?" Cally asked. "Or was there some other reason?"

[swordsandsoccer]

"Because there wasn't any water, yes," Dolf said, with a little nod, "And because sometimes there would be waterfalls or the water would just be going too fast. I had to save some of the kids from drowning sometimes." He sighed a little, but he wasn't going to get depressed today, dammit.

Instead he gently pulled Cally towards him, or at least tried to.

[onlymistaken]

Somehow she picked up on that subtle hint, and leaned in closer. "It sounds like a very exciting life, in spite of the dangers - or perhaps because of them."

[swordsandsoccer]

He smiled a little. "We went walking in class this morning," Dolf confided. "It was a little like when we did the same on Hawaii. I like it -- I kind of miss it, really. Nothing makes you feel more free than that life. To walk with your head in the empty sky, looking after your own food and water, surrounded by friends."

There had been a lot of good things about the Crusade, and it was time he remembered them too.

[onlymistaken]

The convenient thing about having someone's arm about your waist was that it made finding their fingers with yours rather easy. "Do you want to go back there? As it seems happened in Femke's life?"

[swordsandsoccer]

"Does it make sense if I say I don't know?" Dolf asked, glancing down at their fingers. "When I left, I thought I wanted to go home. But shortly before that, I wasn't sure, and I'm not sure now."