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Who: Milla and Psiioniic
What: Milla needs cheering up from her post-death aftereffects. The solution? KITTENS.
Where: 431 Peepers St
When: Late afternoon, 2/6
Warnings: EXTREME CUTENESS.

It's been hard for Milla, since she came back to life. She's felt so...strange. Awful. The last time she was this depressed, she'd just lost all her children, and while her death at the Condesce's house was certainly traumatic, it doesn't explain the violence of her emotional reaction to it.

It doesn't help that her nightmares have been worse and her leg-stumps have been bleeding on and off, too. It's been getting a little better the past day or two, but she still feels awful about everything, and even though Psii has recovered from his amnesia the two of them are tiptoeing around each other after how very not well that went.

He's out at the moment, though - late home from work - so Milla stays curled on the couch, waiting for their drone children to come home, feeling like she doesn't much want to do anything ever again. God, she's in such a funk, this is so weird.

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"You say that as if he's not you." She kisses his cheek softly, scritching the tabby behind the ears. Psii didn't seem to mind the affection a few minutes ago, after all. "And you know it's better if you get along with the things that live in your house, mm? These little carlings are part of the family, don't be so mean."

"Mrph." As far as he's concerned, they aren't, not anymore. As Artollo, he did disgusting, wretched things to keep his own husk safe, and without even a cause worth any of it. The Psiioniic is different. The Psiioniic can be a guardian, a protector, a friend...

Although a rather piss poor one considering recent events, really.

Psii just sticks his tongue out at the advice. "I'm not being mean. It'sth being mean. Look at it. Trying to be adorable ath it tearth my thleeveth to threadth." Okay. A slight exaggeration.

"It is adorable. No trying involved." She ruffles his hair, smiling fondly. Her mood's already starting to lift, when Psii is obviously trying so hard at something he's not comfortable with, just for her sake.

"I think Artollo was a sad and lonely boy. That doesn't make you less of a man, to have been him. In fact, I'd say you wouldn't be the Psiioniic if you hadn't been Artollo first, mm?" Milla tucks a stray hair behind his ear. "Artollo was hard and hurting, but he had hope. He just didn't know what to do with it except survive. There's no shame in that."

How does she do that? Is it that obvious what a wreck of a troll he is, that even without her psychic abilities, she can tell? It can't be possible he told that much, can it? As she fiddles with her hair, he just glances back at her from the corner of his eyes, unsure.

She smiles at his oblique glance, gently reaching up and turning his head towards her, kissing him softly.

"It's okay to be or have been Artollo," she murmurs against his lips. "It's okay to be you, darling. I think you're wonderful."

For all that people keep telling him that, he still has such a hard time believing it, even with Milla right up against him, smiling and looking right into his eyes. "Artollo wath a fuck up," he mutters helplessly, not even minding when one of the kittens crawls about on his lap like it's new territory.

This is getting into very strange and emotionally open territory. It's not a proper pile, but it is full of cushions and two cats, so is that the same thing? Maybe he should learn more about humans besides the bare minimum. Still awkward, he asks, "You papped me when I... came back. Are you trying to... 'rail me?"

"But it's still okay," she replies, pulling away and patting his hand. She scoots up against his side, cuddling into him even as she snuggles the kitten on her own lap. "Even if he was suspicious and scared, he still tried to help, you know. With nothing in return."

At the next question though, she blinks, totally confused all over again. "Pap? Rail? What's that, darling?"

Now would possibly be a good time to tell her that he would probably do a great many bizarre and horrible things for oranges, but Psii decides to skip on that for now. There are more important matters to discuss. Like cultural bizarreness.

"Papping! The- you know, you did it, thith-" Reaching over, he paps her lightly on the cheek before pulling back awkwardly. "It'sth what morailth do. The pale quadrant, the diamond romance, moirallegiance. Are you telling me humanth don't have anything like a balanced partnerthip?"

"We do have several kinds of balanced partnership, but...we only call one of them romance." Blink, blink. So confused. "I think you'd probably better explain how all this works for you, darling. I've never been part of your culture, remember? I didn't know touching someone's face was always romantic for you."

"Jutht one?" He can't help it. Sure, Signless and Disciple have... their thing, but that's them. It's bizarre to think of an entire culture that doesn't even have something as basic as morails. Maybe that explains Mayfield. "God, okay, hold on- here, take thith-" He shoves the cat onto her lap again before scurrying off into the kitchen.

When he returns, he has a pad of paper and a pencil. Settling onto the couch again, he draws a box, then splits it up into four other boxes. Heart, diamond, spade, club. "Alright, tho, you have your four romanceth. There'th redrom and blackrom. I gueth thith whole wifethprit thing ith more like our redrom? Blackrom generally involveth more punching or thtabbing or rumor mongering... That thort of thing. With me tho far?"

"...Not really!" Milla confesses, laughing a little. "So...love is redrom? What's redrom? And if love is red, what's black?"

Well, he didn't expect her to get it right away, and Psii has to admit that this isn't really his specialty. Maybe he should have just called Dii. He taps on the heart and diamond. "Redrom ith matethpritsthip and moraillegiance. I gueth love hath thome thtuff to do with it, but there'th altho pity you have to factor in. And black ith hatred of courthe."

"Okay. I don't really...understand why hating someone is romantic, but I'll put that down to your culture." She smiles over at him, still petting the kittens. "So how do all these four romances function? What kinds of feelings are involved, what sorts of things do you do for each other?"

"Well, for two, they involve giving genetic material to the Mother Grub. That would be the heart and the thpade." Quickly, he scribbles down 'Kismessisitude' besides the spade box. Fuck the world, he is not saying that word. "The other two are for more thocial reathonth, I gueth, but are jutht ath important.

Another pause, and he scribbles down the rest of the names besides their respective boxes. "The gray quadrant- the club- ith the only one which includeth three trollth. Which one do you want to know about firtht?"

"Hmm. Why don't we start with the heart and the diamond? That seems closer to what humans do, so I think it'll be easier to understand." She taps the symbols gently.

"Fair enough." A shrug and he loses himself in thought trying to figure out how to word it. Milla might notice that when he does this, his tongue tends to stick out just slightly from the middle of his lips. "I'm no expert, conthidering I've been here for hardly long at all, but I gueth a matethprit ith like human partnerth, if I'm reading you right. Thometimeth they live with each other, thometimeth not. I don't really know too much of your human romance bethideth tha- dammit, hold on."

Dumb cat is trying to climb up his chest. Psii makes a small noise of discontent before picking him up and letting him perch on his shoulder. "Okay, anyway. A morail ith different. A morail keepth you thafe, thane. If you thuffer from emotional ithueth, they're the oneth who try and talk you through it, or at leatht keep you from flipping your thit. Phythical touching and feelingth jamth, thothe are big thingth."

"Oh, I see! That makes more sense, then." Milla pauses, considering. "So when you asked if I wanted to 'rail' you, you meant if I was trying to be your moirail."

Another pause while she dotes on the calico still climbing on her.

"I suppose I'd like to be both of those things for you."

"Yeah, that'sth pretty much-" But then her words reach his brain and he gives a little surprised jerk, the cat forced to abscond from his shoulder. A strangled kind of noise leaks from his throat. "Wait what?"

"Well," she says patiently, scooping up the absconding tabby, "as we've gotten closer I've started having romantic feelings - of the normal human type, I should say - towards you, and I'd certainly like to try dating you and seeing how it goes, darling. On the other hand, you have so much stress in your life that I feel very protective of you. I want to keep you safe and help you to be happy. Does that make sense?"

"Well, people, you know, they quadrant flip thometimeth, but that'sth kind of-" He looks around helplessly as if the kittens might help him. One just yawns at him. Now would be a great time to have one of his friends nearby. "That'sth not what you're talking about, I think? Uh." Needing something to do with his hands, he reaches up to run one through his hair, and forgets that he's still holding his pencil. The tip nearly goes into his eye. "Ow!"

"Darling, are you all right?" Milla fusses immediately, pulling the pencil out of his hand and checking him over. "Honestly, you are so silly sometimes! Shush now, there's no need to panic."

There is a small little mark from where the pencil jabbed him near the eyebrow, but not much else, thankfully. Psii's face is quite flushed and he shrugs his shoulders up around his ears. "I'm fine! I'm fine, I'm not panicking. Who'th panicking."

"I'm not going to press you for an answer right this instant, you know," she says quietly, smoothing some of Psii's hair back from his face. "I'd just like to try things out with you, darling. Go on a few dates. Think about it, okay? But you don't have to answer just yet."

And with that she turns back to cuddling the kittens. "When were these little babies fed last, mm?"

...He has no idea what humans do on dates.

But with the conversation drifting from that topic, he calms down and resolves to ask about alien mating rituals some other time. Cats are the new topic apparently? Okay. "Well, I don't know, I kind of jutht... bought them from Dii."

"Out of concern for me? You are a sweetheart." She almost kisses his cheek, the gesture familiar between them, but then pauses, considering that maybe he doesn't want to feel pressured by that right now. "We should probably get things set up for them, then. What do you think we should name them?"

A blank stare.

"...You name them?"

Aliens. So. weird.

An equally blank stare.

"You don't?"

Blank stare olympics.

"Highbloodth might? But not a lot of lowbloodth have the rethourtheth for anything more than our luthuth..."

"When you were Artollo you kept talking about high and low bloods, too...mind telling me what that's about? And anyway, now that you can have a pet, why not name it, mm?"

"What would you even name it..." Still positively bewildered, he grabs the pencil and paper again, and writes down the list of known blood colors, top to bottom, high to low.

"Trollth don't all have the thame colorth like humanth do. We have different oneth. You remember the Condethe? That'sth our Empreth, ath high at you can go becauthe her blood ith tyrian purple. Dii ith green, which ith a pretty alright color, more or leth in the middle." Smirking darkly, he taps 'yellow'.

"And that'sth me. Yellow, near the bottom." A pause, and then he scribbles in something to the side, away from the orderly list- 'BRIIGHT CHERRY RED'.

"Eth ithn't on the thpectrum. Nobody elthe hath ever had that color blood before. Ath far ath motht trollth are contherned, he'th a mutant."

"Anything you want!"

But, point taken. She leans in to watch as he scribbles the colors in a column.

"So basically you have blood very much like the spectrum of visible light...that's so interesting! And Signless, who has blood the color of a human's, doesn't fit with this dynamic. Well, there's nothing wrong with being different, and he's a very sweet boy." She smiles over at Psii. "How is he doing now that things are back to...something more normal?"

A snort. "For you humanth, maybe it'sth no big deal, but back home, he'd be culled for it like that."

When the topic of Signless and the... experiment is brought up, however, Psii falls silent, staring down at the little list he's made. Finally, slowly, he answers. "He'll... He'll be okay. The finth are thtill there, but I think they'll leave thoon enough..." Hunching in on himself with his elbows on his knees, he sighs. "They did thomething really fucked up with that thychic trick of theirth... Tyrianth aren't thuppothed to have that thort of power. Only the Condeth'th hellbeatht of a guardian..."

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