Seniara

((One last feeble attempt for this to notdie. At this point, I wouldn't be afraid of offending anyone. If it's too offensive, it will be edited or the thread will be locked, and that's no worse than the thread dying of inactivity, is it?))

Micaela finished her tea. The stillness had been relaxing, but now it began to be something between boring and disconcerting. After quietly placing her dishes in the sink, she made her way back to the ladies' bedroom.

((Not posting makes the baby LaserJesus cry . . .))

Micaela emerged from the bathroom, wrapped in a pink bathrobe, her still-wet hair hanging limply around her head. Entering the kitchen, she made a cup of tea, sat down, and allowed herself to enjoy both the silence and the tea.

Micaela woke up early in the morning. Slowly, she rose from the couch, her blanket draped over her like a mantle. Walking to the girls room, she entered, hopped over the space which Varon had occupied, and tossed her blanket on her bed. Grabbing her knapsack, she headed to the bathroom, again hopping over where Varon was.

Savoring the peace of the morning, she began to take a long, hot shower.

((OOC: Is Stu keeping up with this, or has he left the thread for greener postcounts?))

Micaela stayed up cleaning the dishes, even as the others drifted away, one by one, off to bed. After Ash left, she turned off the lights, but continued cleaning. Finally, satisfied with her cleaning job, she herself headed to sleep.

Walking into the women's bedroom, she walked toward the last remaining bed. Her journey was cut short, however, as she tripped over Varon's unconscious form, falling with a loud thud. Embarrassed, she picked herself up, but no one was awake. After a few failed attempts to move, or even rouse Varon, she gave up. Changing into her sleepwear, she grabbed the blanket and pillow off her bed, walked into the lounge, and went to sleep on the couch, wrapped in her blanket.

"O-kay . . . maybe Arden would be the best . . . "

Following this comment a mental image of Ash formed in his head, three days unshaven, holding a tankard of some sort of liquor, and singing a heavily slurred drinking song.

"That's really pathetic, but Arden may be the best for the job . . . Unless we decided to make a girl out of him . . ." She grinned, amused by the thought.

"Well, everyone, it looks to be getting late. We should probably head to bed, too. I'll take care of cleaning this up." Saying this, Micaela covered the pies, put the ice cream away, and began collecting the dishes, to take them to the sink.

Micaela had shrunk, visibly nervous from the sudden assault by the two women, but said nothing.

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"YES! Let us sit together with this delicious PIE and ICE CREAM and discuss our past battles as HEROIC SIBLINGS!!!"

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Recovering, now that the girls were distracted, she approached Jason and, trying to keep a low profile, asked him, "See what I mean?"

Micaela's eyes darted from Ash to Jason, then back to Ash.

"Uhm . . . Jason, do you think you would mind teaching Ash how to act more . . . well, civilized? Unless, that is," she said, grinning slyly, "You think Varon or Arden would be better role-models?"

Moving quickly, Micaela saves one of the plates from its pending ice creamification, and sets it aside for herself. Then, one by one, she deposits a slice of pie on each of the plates. Finally, she reaches into a nearby drawer, and sets a handful of forks and spoons on the counter.

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"I'll take a slice, and perhaps once I see this ICE cream, I may want some of that, too."

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"You don't need to emphasise the word 'ice.' I was doing that to differentiate it from 'eyes.' If you want ice cream, you can check the freezer. Frankly, I could care less."

As she spoke, she began dividing the pie into slices. Finishing, she paused, and looked around the room, "Uhm . . . could someone grab plates?"

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"Maybe we should all just have our pie and go to bed. It's kinda late, and all this baking is exhausting work. The whole eye's cream thing, that exceeded my weirdness quota for today. Not to mention, I'm kinda curious about what the show will have for us tomorrow."

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As Jason was speaking, Micaela had gone to the oven, and returned with the steaming apple pie, which she then placed on an empty area of counterspace to cool off.

"Well, we still need to wait for the apple pie to cool off, unless we want to save it for tomorrow, that is," Then, grabbing a knife, "The orange is ready, though. Who wants a slice?"

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"You mean people actually eat this 'eye's cream'"

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Micaela replied in a total deadpan, "Yes, that is exactly what she meant. You probably won't be surprised to learn that many people like to eat eye's cream with ladyfingers."

After a moment, realizing that Ash would probably misunderstand, she amended the statement, "Ice cream. As in 'frozen water cream.' It's pretty much what it sounds like. Cold, solid cream. And ladyfingers are a type of cookie. Don't get any ideas."

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She turns to Ash with a bright smile. " Ash, Midget is not a respectfully term for people who are not blessed with height. Midget is ususal used to describe people who are abnormally short and it's a derogatory term. If you called a drunken biker-boy a midget, he will probably try to hurt you."

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As Kegen said this, a shocked expression appeared on Micaela's face, apparently unnoticed by Kegen.

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"I think I'm gonna go change while I wait for the apple pie to get done," she replies softly and heads for the girl's dorm.

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Glaring at Kegens back as she leaves, Micaela grumbles, "'Blessed with height' indeed. . . "

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"Much better. So...do we have ice cream to go with these pies?" she asks cheerfully as she finishes securing her long hair.

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By this time, Micaela had regained a pleasant appearance, and seemed to have forgotten that previous slight.

"We might. I haven't checked, but this house seems to be well-stocked . . ."

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"Let's leave a couple of slices for the midget guy and Mister Zoolander, shall we?"

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Micaela managed to maintain her composure, but just barely. She looked ready to burst with laughter, but somehow, was able to keep from doing so. She looked at her wrist, which was distinctly bereft of a watch, "Hmmm . . . mebbe as little as ten or fifteen minutes, for the orange, at least. The apple needs to finish baking, first." Saying this, she slouched back agaisnt the counter behind her, the surface roughly level with her shoulders. Then, noticing Arden, she called over to him, "Hey, *snicker* midget guy! You want to join us?"

Hero 2 was a Welsh hero, known for his ridiculously extravagant bow.

5 years ago, in a weird freak accident, Hero 2 garroted himself with his own bow. Everyone mourned this incident, because Hero 2 was beloved throughout the world.

In order to lighten the mood, Positron and Synapse, playing one of those crazy Freedom Phalanx practical jokes, stole Manticore's bow and jury-rigged it into a Flagpole for the flag on City Hall.

Statesman, inspired by this patriotic display, decided that it was a fitting guesture, and decided, in memory of Hero 2, that all heroes, with the exception of Manticore, who wasn't too amused with the practical joke, should hang up their bows for five years.

As the first pie baked in the oven, Micaela began work on the second pie, an apple pie.

Though still instructing and guiding those interested in learning, she was "in the zone," so to speak, and nearly oblivious to anything which was not pie-related.

Eventually, the apple pie was in the oven, and the orange creme pie was on the counter, cooling.

". . . And now we're pretty much done," leaning on the counter, and once more becoming aware of her surroundings, Micaela's eyes passed over the other housemates, "So . . . any questions?"

((OOC: Am I the only one getting the feeling that Super Happy Bright'n'Shiny Bubblegum Trio has a darker story than the other 5 of us put together? O.o))

Micaela winced as she heard the duo's exclamation, but was able to maintain a calm facade, even as she was accosted by Samantha.

"Well, we're almsot done with this one, but we've got enough ingredients to make another kind of pie, I guess. What kind of fruit do we have here?"

Yup, I get to be Mom. This is going to be a LONG . . . uhm . . . however long I stay, I guess . . . Then again, who would want to get rid of mom? Her eyes drifted toward Jason and Etherburn, Ah, right. The teenagers. The thought brought an amused smile to her face. One big happy dysfunctional family. . .

"Okay, we're going to need some new ingredients, 'cause we'll be using a different kind of crust. I'll grab those. And, Jason, was it? Would you mind placing the filling over the crust, rather than eating it? Just try to make sure it's evenly spread."

(OOC: Not to split hairs, but that recipe doesn't call for kneading dough. Don't worry, though. There are similarly monotonous tasks involved. )

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"Do you want any help with that pie? If not, I'll be.. uh.. hanging out right here, playing decorate-the-dwarf."

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"Yes, now that you mention it, I could probably use some help. Could you check the refrigerator? There should be milk and eggs in there, and we'll need both."

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"Alright, show me how to do things out side of a box."

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Looks like I get to be the mom in this big, happy, dysfunctional family . . .

"Well, I've got all the ingredients here now, so now we're ready to begin. First, we'll want to make the crust . . ."

As she went through the various steps of baking the pie, she explained what she was doing, occasionally charging her two helpers with various tasks to speed the process along.

Micaela's eyes widened as she just barely caught the orange.

"Careful! We don't want to ruin them, if we plan on doing anything with them. I'll have to check the pantry first, to make sure we have the stuff to make a pie."

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"OOH! What could you make?" Ash's eyes were lit up in completely distracted fascination.

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"Hmmm . . . well, could make a cake or pie using the oranges as a primary ingredient . . . even barring that, lots of baked goods use citrus for added flavor. What sounds interesting?"

Forget music. Pastry soothes the savage beast. The thought brought an amused smile to Micaela's face.

An amused smile appearing on her face, she turned to Kegen, "Well, if Jason over there starts leering at us like he did that piece of orange, I have no objections." Then, turning back to Asha nd jason, "Speaking of which, you might want to hold off on eating all of those. If you leave enough there, I could bake something . . ."

"So . . . uh . . . what now? Immunity challenges? Deathmatches? Bug eating? Or do we just sit around staring at each other?"

Micaela quietly sat through the other heroes' stories, showing deep interest in Etherburn'ss tory, politely paying attention to Varon's tale, barely suppressing a grin at Jason's "Blue Steel" comment, again paying polite interest in jason's story, then listened to Ash's with a totally unreadable expression. As Ash seemed to lose interest, she spoke up, "Well, I guess it's my turn now . . ."

"Hmmm . . . Let's see . . . Well, I grew up as a child prodigy, finished school early, got my PhD before I was twenty, and was well on my way to becoming a multimillionaire. If any of you pay attention to that kind of stuff, you probably recognize me. Anyways, I kept upwith that, was doing rather well for myself, then the Rikti invaded. Worked as a field medic and cyber-doc during the War; nasty business, that. After that, I went through an incident which resulted in some particularly nasty PR. 'swhy you don't really hear about me anymore. Since then, I've registered as a hero to help Paragon rebuild. And. . .yeah . . . that's pretty much it . . ."

Micaela shifted in her seat, seeming somewhat uncomfortable, "So . . . who wants to go first?"

"Yes, that does sound like a good idea. It would be pretty akward to live with a bunch of people you know nothing about."

Taking a seat on the floor, cross-legged, Micaela faced the other household members, "Okay, we should set up a couple ground rules first. Plenty of heroes have very painful stories, so if you're not comfortable telling us anything, no pressure. It would be nice for us to know something about you, though. Secondly, we need to remember that this is kind of public, so things like discussing classified information would be taboo, to say the least. Anyone have anything else to add before we get started?"