It's almost noon on the 20th, and Ilyna is downstairs in a meeting with Felcolus. The weather outside has worsened drastically over the last few hours, and the visibility out the rec room windows is limited by the snowfall.
#RedrockAgency – September 11, 2019
Renala enters the rec room and immediately heads for the coffee maker. She is still shivering from having just been outside, and her face is still a bit numb. She discards the used filter from the machine, and puts in a new one and the right amount of grounds in it; for her that is, the next person pouring from the pot might not agree. She's wearing a fully zipped-up white fleeze jacket and gray pants.
Li is, as is often the case, sitting in the couch. The TV is playing generic, kid-friendly cartoons. Human today, by the looks of it. Li's focus is on the paper in front of her on the coffee table. She's hunched forward to reach it, drawing in silence. She's wearing a simple blue dress, sweater discarded in the couch.
Renala turns around after the coffee maker roars to life, and looks over at the couch. A small smile tugs at her lips as she sees she's not with the VI. Renala has kept her distance for the most part, not wanting to get in the way of another T'Rea's parenting, but everyone makes exceptions sometimes. Besides, it would be a few minutes before the coffee is done anyway. She crosses the room and stops by the
side of the couch. "Hey, Li," she says tentatively, a little awkward knowing what the kid has been through. "What are you drawing?"
Li startles a little as the coffee machine starts making noise, gaze snapping over towards Renala. "Hi." she says quietly, gaze dropping back to her drawing as she's asked about it. Her eyebrows furrow a little and she holds it out for the asari to look at.
Renala gently takes the drawing, careful to not crease the sheet while studying it. She slips past and sits down next to Li before handing it back. "Why are you drawing here when we have a perfectly good table over there?" she says with a bob of her head. "Do what you want, of course, but if ilyna asks, I told you about it, right?" She chuckles, and a sigh sigh follows; she knows how effective that strategy
is. She places her finger on the paper. "That's Ilyna? And a screen? With the inceassant Collector news, right?" Renala chuckles, but it's cut short as her attention is drawn to the puzzling background. "What's that outside the window? It doesn't look like the street lights I saw when I...," she stops herself from telling what she was doing there last, "walked past last time."
Li 's frown deepens a little, seeming almost puzzled by Renala's lack of comprehension. "It's the monster." she says as if that should be obvious.
Renala frowns with her for a brief moment. It was what she feared, even if she has started to associate the color yellow with it more than red. "What's it doing outside your window, though?" she asks with a tilt of her head. "Is it too cheap to get its own screen to watch the news on?" Her tone isn't entirely genuine despite her best efforts.
Li goes silent, her frown deepening as she sinks back into the couch, pulling her legs up and wrapping her arms around them, chin resting on her knees as she looks at the TV.
Renala sighs and turns her attention to the screen as well, going silent as well for a moment. Aeyna had many difficult days as a pureblood child, but Li's problem are on a whole another world. After a few more seconds of tense silence, she decides on a change of plans: if jokes didn't work, perhaps a distraction. "You excited for Christmas?" she asks. "I have a little girl back home on Thessia that most
certainly is." Despite the uninteded heaviness of the earlier art critique, thinking about Aeyna does bring her a genuine smile. "She keeps sending me pictures of her and her friend decorating, making cookies and all that."
Renala looks at her wide-eyed. "You really haven't heard of it?" she says. "I didn't think this T'Rea needed Renala's help, but well, I've been wrong before." She shifts closer and her omni-tool starts to glow around her right arm. She brings up the last picture from her messages. "I still remember Aeyna selling me on the idea after her friend's family invited us over for it. Good food, family spending time
together, the humans even counted down the days for it." She looks away from the picture at Li. "The part that got her all excited the first time, and I think you'd love is that it's a gift-giving celebration," she says, a fond smile crossing the usually pessimistic matron at the memories this digs up. "Don't ask me about the context of it, though, because that wasn't important to little Aeyna."
The picture is of two asari at a table. They don't look older than human ten year olds. The left one is of violet skin with white markings over her eyes and the right one is pale blue with blue lines on her cheeks and crests. They're both in matching red summer dresses and christmas hats. On the table there's some brown gingerbread dough and cookie cutters, and the picture has also caught the violet one sampling said
dough. It's taken in the evening, but it lacks the snow and darkness so commonly associated with the holiday.
Li homes in on what is obviously the most important word among what Renala has to say. "Gifts?" she asks, shooting the asari a curious look. She lets her legs extend forward again, craning her neck a little to look at the picture. "Who's that?"
Renala chuckles as she picks out the important word, but she decides to focus on the second question instead. "The sneaky sampler on the left is my Aeyna. She lives with her mother on Thessia, but I still call and visit her when I get chance. Just because we're half a galaxy away doesn't mean I can't try to be a good father." She points to the other one. "And that's her best friend, Marit. Her father is human,
She switches the picture to one of Aeyna hanging up a red ball on the tree. The grimace in the young girl's face and the occasional shed needle on the floor should be enough to give away that this tree may not be fake. If Li hadn't been kept in the dark about all this, that is.
Li listens closely, even if some of it goes over her head. Something Renala says causes the return of her frown, but she doesn't voice whatever is bothering her. Instead she focuses on a different part of her elaboration. "My mom is from Tessia." she says, as if that might be new information to Renala. She studies the picture until it changes, and then her attention goes up to the asari next to her. "Why aren't they here?" It's an
Renala nods at the information, and is about to say something about it when she's hit with the risky question. "Aeyna's mom won't let her come here," she says, looking down at her. "And she's like Ilyna in a lot of ways other than looking like her at a glance. Trust me, she won't even compromise." She places a hand gently on her shoulder. "I'm sure Aeyna would love to meet you, though."
Renala raises her brows. "Nallie is a worrywart," she says with a sigh. "I was barely allowed to take her outside her home city on Thessia when I went to visit. Going to another planet with her just isn't happening." It's an exaggeration, but she'd rather go with that than that she thought Aite was too unsafe. "We disagree on a lot of things, me and Nallie," she says, "which is why I'm here and not on
Renala nods. "Yeah, I wish it wasn't so," she says, patting her shoulder before taking back her hand. "But let us focus on more high priority issues," she asks. "Christmas. The day is in... six days? I don't know. I never had to keep track before, but someone around here ought to know." She skips a few pictures ahead to one of the two girls inspecing the colorful wrapped gifts under the same tree, probably
making guesses about their contents. "You have to nag and annoy Ilyna until she make it happen, alright?" she says. "That is the daughter's duties." Or maybe that was just Aeyna. She frowns as she adds with a shake of her head, "I still can't believe they haven't told you...."
Li perks up a little at the change in subject, studying the picture curiously. "What's in the boxes...?"
Renala chuckles as she looks at the picture with her. "That's a secret only the giver knows," she says. "The lucky person whose name is on the label has to wait until the Christmas day itself to open it." Renala returns her gaze at Li beofre adding, "That's one advantage of getting in late, at least: you skip many days of seeing these and not being allowed to open them."
Li looks thoughtful. "Am I going to get gifts?" she asks hopefully, a bit more energy entering her demeanor as her gaze darts up to Renala.
Renala gives a sharp nod. "Of course," she says. "I refuse to believe anything else." She shuts her omni-tool off and stands up. "I should get back to work," she says. "Remember what I said, okay? Don't let them get away with not telling you." Renala slips past her once more and starts making her way over to the kitchen to stop the coffee maker.
Li 's eyebrows furrow, falling silent again as she ponders why nobody's told her about this Christmas. Ilyna is definitely in for some questions.
Renala pours the coffee over into a tall insulated can, and closes it. There's a lot of work to do considering their current main enemy just defeated the Colelctors, and this is what's going to get her get through it. She casts another glance at Li as she reaches the doorway, but decides to not interrupt her further before slipping out of the rec room.