66 Posts
EP
EXP
Total
10 Years
male
"batty"
Civilian-Rank Quirk:
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Post by Shiloh Dubois on Sept 27, 2020 1:30:49 GMT -4
bedtime for baby bat THE LAST FEW MONTHS HAD BEEN full of new things. Shiloh had been taken-in to the authorities by Yellow Jacket, passed around by strangers in suits, asked the same questions until he answered them… It smarted of betrayal against Bishop and Wesker, but Monsieur Murakami assured the bat that he hadn’t. They wanted to find the brothers and give them a real home, and Shiloh’s answers could help them find the brothers. There was a lot arguing about where the bat would live, especially since he was a “flight risk”.
He never did get the chance to tell them that “flying” wasn’t so “risky” for a bat.
And now... he was on the floor, in a living room… the t.v. was quietly streaming a cartoon that Shiloh was only half paying attention to… and Shiloh was using his wing-claws to manipulate these enormous, interlocking plastic blocks, creating a strange, cubic structure. A heavy pair of footsteps snagged his attention. That was Monsieur Murakami, Shiloh could tell by the heavy footsteps. This was his house.
Well, their house. But it was Monsieur Murakami’s house first. Shiloh wasn’t still totally convinced that it was their house, even if Monsieur Murakami said so. It was just another house. Shiloh had been passed between so many houses already.
To make matters even more interesting, Monsieur Murakami lived with Yellow Jacket—or, as Shiloh had learned, Madame Tsutsuji. They were both heroes. And being heroes meant unpredictable schedules. They came and went at peculiar hours, sometimes after Shiloh was supposed to be asleep.
Shiloh was used to this kind of thing before, though. It was just like Papa—he’d leave when Shiloh was awake, come back when he was asleep… except that one time that he didn’t. So… that was probably why Shiloh didn’t like it when Tsutsuji or Murakami left just before he went to bed.
Tonight, they were both home, though. Shiloh could hear Murakami tromping around, and the faint hum as Tsutsuji went about doing… whatever she did.
Shiloh… focused on his plastic block tower, his legs half-folded in front of him. He yawned bigly, his big eyes squinting shut, before resuming his work. He wore a little pair of overalls and a t-shirt that’d had the sleeves cut-off. The bat worked slowly, trying to blink he sleepiness from his eyes. He... had to finish... this block-house.
| quirk: e-rank echolocation, flight, speed; f-rank durability, multilingualism |
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287 Posts
0 EP
EXP
Total
33 Years
Female
"Yellow Jacket"
Rookie-Rank Quirk:
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Post by Hachi Tsutsuji on Sept 29, 2020 13:34:50 GMT -4
 Let those eyes sparkle and shine,
Never a tear, baby of mine.
It still felt like a most unusual series of events that lead her here. From the entirely unexpected capture of the young boy Shiloh, to coming to claim him as her own, to living with Tobias Murakami after fretting about how safe her own home was; it felt like so much had happened in a short amount of time, but in all truth, it had been longer than it felt. Yet Hachi was still not as used to living with not just a child but also a housemate as she wished she was. She was used to living alone for most of the time. Primula had been the exception, and even she only visited on weekends now, otherwise staying at the UA dormitories or with Sonya, her legal guardian. She had been alone for most of the time.
Now that was no longer the case. Now she was always home with somebody, either Shiloh or Tobias or both of them. It felt...good. She had suffered from a deep-rooted fear of being alone since even before Solenn's death, and that had only worsened it. Living in that home she had always forced herself to stay out either on patrol or at school to the point of exhaustion, and then only returned to sleep, eat, and prepare to leave the otherwise empty space once more. Now that there were others in the house she came home to, she felt like she could actually set down roots. Be comfortable.
She wasn't. Not well, at least.
It was hard to teach a long-term bachelorette, even one who loved children and teaching as Hachi did, to settle.
She forgot what time was an acceptable time to go to sleep. She always woke at the same time--she had classes to teach, after all--but she was used to pushing herself until she was ready to pass out. How did normal people gauge when they were ready to sleep? It hadn't helped with Tobias' own schedule as both of them were still running on their own hero patrols and duties.
So she needed a way to keep herself to a "normal" sleep cycle schedule. A routine, even if it wasn't her own specifically, that helped her keep in mind when it was time to rest. And since she was horrible at taking care of herself, she had to figure out how to do it.
And the obvious answer was Shiloh.
He was a child, still. Younger than anyone that Hachi had ever worked with or cared for, and also far less independent than any of those as well. Even Primula, as immature and confused as she could be, usually had put herself to bed and woken herself up on a regular timer. Shiloh didn't, because Shiloh couldn't, because he was still too young. So to keep herself on a schedule, she would work to keep him to one, too.
Hachi hovered into the room, her entrance preceded the low buzz of gossamer wings rubbing against each other at a rapid speed. She found Shiloh with some toy blocks in front of the television and took a moment, eyes watching him without visible expression. He was so focused on his building, so serious that he was squinting at it, but not so much so that he could stifle the yawn that made his surprisingly sharp teeth show.
She glanced at a clock on the wall. It wasn't horribly late, but it would take time to get him ready for bed, so now was a good time to begin the transition. She hovered over and dropped to his side, digitgrade legs folding beneath her. Although he had been working to improve his Japanese, she still chose to speak to the boy in French, as he was most comfortable with. And in a way it comforted her as well. Fate was funny like that. "Bonsoir. What is it that you're building, Shiloh?"
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66 Posts
EP
EXP
Total
10 Years
male
"batty"
Civilian-Rank Quirk:
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Post by Shiloh Dubois on Oct 18, 2020 13:20:22 GMT -4
bedtime for baby bat SHILOH DIDN'T REALLY EVEN SEEM AWAKE as he worked, to be entirely honest. His eyelids, too heavy to be kept open, drooped shut over his large, fathomless eyes, and he kept them shut, working off of echolocation alone rather than using what paltry amount of eyesight he had. He was close enough to sense the finer details of the structure, the empty spaces where blocks could be slid into place, etc. He’d only really need his eyes if he wanted to get a sense of color.
The child slowed slightly, listing forward. But his equilibrium, sensing the tilt, jolted him back into motion. He wasn’t sleepy. He had to finish the tower.
He felt Hachi’s return to the living room before he sensed her. A low thrum always filled the air whenever she came or went. Shiloh’s ear twitched. The bat began to work with a little more vigor.
Hachi finally closed the distance, landing beside the youth like one massive, formerly-airborne lump.
Her French was rough, at least to the bat’s trained ear—but the gesture was nice enough. Better than having to speak English all the time.
She greeted him and asked what he was making.
“Hi…” the child replied, their voice soft and distracted as they, too, addressed the bee in French, “I’m making… a tower.”
Sure, originally it had been a house, but houses were shorter than towers. Towers were big. Towers meant staying-up to finish. Houses could be finished in much less time.
The structure was a random smattering of colors, and now stood about fifty centimeters off the ground. There was even a door on one side of the building, a void where Shiloh had avoided putting any blocks.
“Do you like it?” Shiloh persisted.
| ft. bee mom quirk: e-rank echolocation, flight, speed; f-rank durability, multilingualism |
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287 Posts
0 EP
EXP
Total
33 Years
Female
"Yellow Jacket"
Rookie-Rank Quirk:
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Post by Hachi Tsutsuji on Oct 23, 2020 20:29:50 GMT -4
Let those eyes sparkle and shine,
Never a tear, baby of mine.
His closed eyes might have implied that the boy was sleeping where he sat, but Shiloh wasn't a normal boy. Hachi tipped herself forward enough to peer around him better, watching the twitch of his ears as he worked through his building without relying on sight. It was such an interesting method of sensing the world around him; Hachi envied it slightly, if only due to her lacking sense of sight. Yes, a compound eye could see quite a bit better than the average human's eye, but it needed to be functional. So she was still at a disadvantage.
Shiloh could see, and then he could "see" through hearing. It was as fascinating as it was impressive.
At least she felt like it was.
"A tower." She mimicked the word, since her own French was still a little lacking. But listening to him was helping. Hopefully. He would be the judge of it, not her. "It's quite impressive. Very sturdy." Hachi small mouth formed into an equally small smile, "I'm very glad you like these blocks. Is it a tower in particular? Or just something you're making up as you go?"
Her eye flickered to the clock once more.
"It is getting late. Would you like to finish the tower, and go to sleep after? Or would you like to save it for morning and I can read to you before bedtime?"
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66 Posts
EP
EXP
Total
10 Years
male
"batty"
Civilian-Rank Quirk:
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Post by Shiloh Dubois on Nov 3, 2020 15:20:41 GMT -4
bedtime for baby bat THE CHILD LIFTED HIS CHIN, looking vaguely smug, as Hachi asked if it was his tower, or a “particular” one. Like one that he’d known, at some point in his life? Shiloh had never flown high enough to get a real sense of the shape of any actual towers—they were just large, cubic protrusions on an otherwise flat surface, which faded into nothingness past a certain point.
“It’s my own tower,” he said proudly, “Thank you.”
The child stifled another yawn, or tried to, without avail.
Hachi announced that it was getting late, offering Shiloh the choice to either stay-up and continue working, or go to bed, with a story, and finish his work later.
“I would like to finish,” Shiloh insisted, unsurprisingly. Was there ever a child that wanted to go to bed?
Of course, while Shiloh said that he wanted to stay up and continue his tower, it didn’t change that he was, clearly, tired. He resumed picking-up blocks and affixing them to the framework of the building, but at one point, his movements began to slow, and he started to list forward again.
Again, Shiloh’s body jerked, sensing that he was going to plop forward, and he resumed placing blocks around the tower’s edge. He was the quintessential “child who wanted to stay awake, whose body had other plans”.
| ft. hachi tsutsuji quirk: e-rank echolocation, flight, speed; f-rank durability, multilingualism |
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