She hesitates just a moment and then grips his hand, adding in her other hand a moment later. "I'm sorry, I just, um, I just don't have any confidence in anything that isn't magic, so... Um, if that's not it, then, what's bothering you?"

Her hands are tiny compared to his and as soft as one might expect from a person that's never done any kind of manual labour in their life.

In reply to Lesleigh Ebongrove (msg # 37):

Jason clams up, opening his mouth several times as if he's going to say somthing before shutting again and sighing. After a moment or so of indecision, "Just...my family..." He breaths out through his nose and frowns in thought,"I'm supposed to lead them...To know where we're supposed to be going and get them there-" The words spill out quickly, but...I'm not sure where I'm going either...Everything that I saw at the festival...everything you said..." Jason shrugs, "I suppose I feel out of my depth..."

He goes silent after that, as if the novelty of saying so many words has drained him.

Lesleigh squeezes his hand and gives him her best attempt at a reassuring smile. "I'll help you. Mama says I've probably forgotten more magic than she ever learned to begin with, but truthfully I haven't the heart to tell her that I haven't forgotten any of it. Ask me anything you want to know, at any time."

In reply to Lesleigh Ebongrove (msg # 39):

Jason raises his eyebrows, from the brief glimpse Jason got of Lesleigh's adopted mother he could only imagine how much she might have learned in her lifetime.
"Do you have a good memory or does magic just...stick?"

Lesleigh ponders this, keeping her hands occupied with a slow tactile examination of his hand. "I think I have a good memory, but it's not that I remember everything the first time I see it or something like that. I just... Well, once I had read everything there was to read in that room, I started over again. And again, and again. I can read very fast, or perhaps I should say that my eyes are very fast, just in general. I can watch the images change on a screen, something that is literally too fast for a human eye. I'm not hindered at all by fog or rain or even the absolute darkness of a room sealed away under the earth, either."

In reply to Lesleigh Ebongrove (msg # 41):

Jason nearly asks if that's a side effect of her eyes but stops himself just in time and they lapsed into a silence as Jason pulled over her words.

To him reading had always been purely practical. Combat assessments, battle plans, terrain directions. It wasn't somthing he took pleasure in either. He always lagged behind the other Cadets with his words and he still struggled even now.

He couldn't imagine reading the same thing over and over again, let alone an entire room if books.

The revelation about her eyes was fascinating as well. He had an inkling that Lesleigh was somthing of a special case in the magical world but if such abilities were commonplace...

Jason started to feel even more out of his depth again and he wondered how the US government had kept a lid on the supernatural happenings of the world. If a magic user could just cast a spell and have the same abilities as a soldier with thousands of dollars worth of high tech equipment...

It boggled the mind.

He was dimly aware of Lesleigh examing his hand and despite everything he found the soft gentle touch was relaxing him slightly.

The food arrived shortly after, brought over by the smiling waitress who gave the both of them a knowing look.

"You're worrying about something again, aren't you?" Lesleigh says before they're interrupted by the waitress, which prompts a sheepish grin as they go through the process of distributing the plates with the waitress giving them that sort of look the entire time.

When she's gone, Lesleigh turns back to Jason and smiles brightly, "This smells amazing. Let's eat, and save our worries for later."

She's content to dig in if he is, her enjoyment of the relatively simple fare that she ordered palpable in the way she sways slightly while chewing.

In reply to Lesleigh Ebongrove (msg # 43):

"I-" Jason started,  not sure how to go on. Everyone always considered him the blank one. A calm collected rock in a sometimes rather dysfunctional squad.

Such a personality was valuable in a high stress life when many different personalities clashed daily. He lent a steadiness that people could fall back on.

But it did leave Jason...isolated at times.

Not many people could read him easily, and those that could were people who had known him for years.

The fact that Lesleigh could do it so easily was...

Jason wasn't sure what it was actually but it felt...refreshing.

"Okay." Jason agrees as his plate is put down in front of him. He attacks it with gusto, showing a uncharacteristic amount of enthusiasm for his food.

He stops abruptly though, looking slightly sheepish as he speaks,"How is yours?"

"My tongue could die from happiness," Lesleigh says in an almost sing-song voice in between munches of her own. She doesn't eat nearly as fast as Jason, and there's not nearly as much food in front of her, but there's no mistaking the sheer joy in her expression, even with her eyes covered.

Then she stabs a small piece of chicken and some lettuce onto her fork before dipping it into the dressing and lifting it up toward Jason. "Would you like a taste?"

"Oh...Uh...Okay." Jason hands twitch awkwardly, as if he's not quite sure of the best way to grab the fork.

After a moment or two of faffing about he simply darts his head forward and eats it off the outstretched fork.

Jason immediately sits back, bit upright, immobile apart from his chewing mouth and his eyes which occasionally dart from side to side.

"It's good." He says, hoping his worry that he's just committed a faux pa isn't noticable.

Lesleigh snickers softly. "This is too much fun, but as much as I love your reactions, you can relax, you know. May I try some of yours?"

In reply to Lesleigh Ebongrove (msg # 47):

Jason relaxes, or at least tries to as he breaths out through his nose again.
"Oh...Sure..." Jason looks for the most intact bit of food he can. After a while he settles on a healthy bit of battered scampi, after dipping it in the home made tartar sauce he offers it to Lesleigh.

As he does he's suddenly unsure whether he should just give her the fork or wait for her to take it off the end of the fork herself, like he did.

Lesleigh doesn't hesitate to take the bite directly from his fork, immediately sitting back up straighter in her surprise. "Wow that's strong!" she says, but she isn't complaining - in fact, she seems to be enjoying it, continuing to sway happily, beaming from ear to ear.



I'm starting to feel like this is dragging a bit, so we can jump forward a while if you want. Or not if you're having fun, but I got nothing in the way of ideas so I'll leave it up to you! ^.^

In reply to Lesleigh Ebongrove (msg # 49):

OOC: Yeah, that might be a good idea. I'm not sure where you want to go though. I had an idea we could just be walking along the pier though if you happy with that?

Works for me!

In reply to Lesleigh Ebongrove (msg # 51):

The smell of Seasalt is palpable as the waves of smash against Liberty Island. Jason's heavy footsteps sound heavily against the solid wooden boardwalk. Although the majority of the night's stars were blotted out by clouds and the light coming from New York a few intrepid ones peek through the night sky.

His previous worries forgotten as he relaxed in Lesleigh's company.

"Thank you for..this." He says as they walk through the walk august night.
This message was last edited by the player at 21:48, Sun 03 Nov 2019.

Lesleigh grinned from her place on Jason's arm. She was walking more slowly than usual in part because she was simply enjoying the tie together, and in part, because she claimed to have eaten so much that she felt sluggish.

She giggles softly at his words and says, "Thank you for coming with me. I had planned out the route to the city but never gathered enough courage to come all the way here by myself."

In reply to Lesleigh Ebongrove (msg # 53):

Jason quirked an eyebrow curiously, "You had a route?"
He hadn't seen any kind of navigation devices on her or her broom.
"How did you know where you were going? I just guessed you were following the coast."

The question wasn't confrontational, just idle conversation as they took in the sights and smells of the boardwalk. They weren't the only people out on the wooden jetty, not even the only couple...

"Couple?" Where had that idea come from...

He looked down at Lesleigh Cellotaped to his arm but didn't say anything.

Lesleigh grins mischievously. "Yes, well, the route follows the coast, but I needed some landmarks or we could have flown too far. There's also the information I collected about shipping lanes, other boats and airplanes so we didn't crash into anything or worse, be seen by a lot of people. Also, you may not have realized it because of the magic, but we were flying approximately eight hundred kilometres an hour, so everything I chose had to be useful while I'm flying at that speed," she says, looking up at him instead of where they're going.

"Did you know the speed of sound is roughly half again that fast? I want to try and break it some day!"

In reply to Lesleigh Ebongrove (msg # 55):

Jason struggled to stop his eyes bugging out, 800 kilometers an hour?
The large boy's mind boggled at the capacity for magic to continuously astound him.
"I'm glad you planned." He said, inwardly imagining how far off course they could have gone if even one tiny thing had been wrong at those speeds.

"I didn't know that, but I would like to see it." He added encouragingly.

"What do you think the first day will be like?"

"Hrm, well... Paul said that it's mostly like a regular school, so on the first day there are a lot of tests to take, but not to worry about them because they're just assessments. The teachers want to know what we do and don't know already so that they can try to teach us better," she says before she starts to hesitate.

After a handful of false starts she says, "There are going to be people there that won't like me, or you and your family, but I don't think there will be any huge incidents on the first day."

In reply to Lesleigh Ebongrove (msg # 57):


For a moment, Jason was silent before breaking the quiet,

"You weren't exaggerating about your family, were you?"

Although phrased as a question, his tone left it in no doubt that it was more of a statement. He subconsciously hugged Lesleigh tighter to him.

He could deal with people not liking him or his family, his family had been trained to fight. To win.

But the thought of Lesleigh being targeted sent a familiar pang of unpleasantness through his stomach.

It was the same feeling he got when he saw his siblings fail at a task or sustain an injury during training.

But this wasn't training and he felt his stomach twist again.

Lesleigh has to stop walking while being held so tightly, but she doesn't complain, electing to embrace Jason in return with what feeble strength her arms possess. "Don't worry. I don't think anybody would do anything that's actually dangerous, and my magic is pretty good, you know? Ah, when you want to go back, let me know," she says.

She doesn't make any move to let go for an awkwardly long moment, though.

Jason doesn't seem to notice the fact Lesleigh hadn't let go and despite the late hour, Jason wasn't in any hurry to get back either, rather enjoying the moment.
"I'm okay staying for a little while longer." He said as they look out over Liberty harbour.

[Private to Lesleigh Ebongrove: OOC: I'm not sure if you want to call it for this scene here? I'm fine continuing if there is more you want to show but it seems like a decent cutting point.)]

I'm gonna cap this one off as finished under the circumstances, which include having already done everything of great interest to us as players, if I'm reading the private messages correctly. The witch and the soldier eventually go home without further event...