Stunted Growth [Open!!]

[MerylStar]

During Meryl's brief explorations of the castle, she'd come across a few studies, after lingering at the door of a few, observing other Residents studying inside, she figured out that it was the best possible place to start her 'research'.

The small, blue-haired girl was perched cross legged on one of the couches inside the room, wearing her trademark cloak. Around her all manner of books and (a few leaflets?) were slowly building a pile, if inspected a leaflet would read "How to speed up the growth of your plants" or an article hastily torn out of a discarded newspaper reading "Good Food for Growing Kids!"

She pulled lightly on one of the decorative stars dangling from her cloak, brow knitted in quiet concentration as she did her best to analyse the information written on the page of the open book resting on her lap. The Star Childe didn't read very often, even in her home that she left years ago, so the 'big words' inside this book (Which would turn out to be for gardening after all, and of no use to her quest) were of no help.

Resigning to this brief defeat, she pushed the book out of her lap and pulled out her notebook, tapping a pencil contemplatively on her chin, blank faced as she faced the list of targets laid out for herself to assist in her goal.

[Lunasola]

After twitching in agitation in his sleep, he blinked his eyes open and squinted around the room. It took a few moments to register that it wasn’t his own room, and that he wasn’t curled up in his own bed. In fact, somehow, he’d ended up sprawled on the carpet in some dusty corner of the room. He tried to push himself up, but only managed to accomplish flopping onto his back with all the grace of a waterlogged corpse. It seemed like his body was unwilling to cooperate too.

He was content (in some abstract definition of the word) to lie there and gaze at the ceiling, counting all the weird notches in the engravings that he hadn’t noticed before. He scratched at his injured shoulder, painfully aware of how bare and naked it felt. That stupid monkey doctor thought she had the right to shave off the fur there-- Then his ears twitched, hearing the faint noise of breathing and tapping. Someone else was in the room.

All too hastily, he twisted around to face them, before his eyes landed on what looked like a young girl with odd coloured hair sitting in a chair. She looked bizarre, and he couldn’t help but be lightly reminded of his room-mate… Now wasn’t the time to think about it. He pushed himself into a crawl, keeping close to the floor as he approached the chair. Upon reaching it, he simply plopped himself down in front of her on the floor, staring up at her intently. If she failed to notice him there, he’d prod at her foot for attention.

[MerylStar]

Blue eyes skimmed the notebook intently, trying to figure out where she'd gone wrong this time. A movement in the room startled her slightly, shown by a flicker of her gaze away from her object of interest. Meryl was aware of the other's presence in the room, she tried to be as quiet as possible of course; as a courtesy. After all, she didn't really know anyone in this strange stone castle. But that was OK, as far as she was concerned.

She looked back down at her notebook, honestly believing she hadn't been noticed. Meryl didn't really understand how quaint she looked to others. Out of mild curiosity, she glanced to monitor where the other had gone, only to find the cat-like creature staring at her on the floor.

The stare was mutually returned. Silently mulling over his appearance instinctively, to gauge whether he would be any danger to her. Dead-pan as ever, she reached out her hand curiously, but flinched back after remembering an unfortunate encounter she once had with a feral cat, who wanted her rations.

Her curiosity over the creature in front of her was shown only by a slight tilt of the head. She resolved to break the silence with a small "Hello."

[Lunasola]

His eyes were intently pinned on her approaching hand, and when she flinched back, so did he. Was she... scared? It was a puzzling notion, but he remained quiet, quietly waiting until she spoke up.

His fur, which had bristled slightly, settled again. Funnily enough, he couldn't scrape the memory of his other encounter in the study - especially not with her sitting on the couch like that. Needless to say, he'd not be joining her.

He meekly returned his own "Hello." Then stared - flatly and unequivocally - before his brows screwed together in some sort of uptight manner. "Who are you? I have not seen your face before." His tone was distinctly unwelcoming.

[MerylStar]

Meryl's social skills were slightly lacking; as such she couldn't really tell when she was unwanted or not, because of this Lunasola's unwelcoming tone went right over her head.

Ah yes, the tradition of exchanging names. Meryl could hardly remember the last time she cared to introduce herself to someone else, but she supposed living in this big castle would mean it was unavoidable. "My name is Meryl." She dipped her head a little, "You haven't seen me around here because I arrived not too long ago." The star-childe tilted her head.

"I've never seen a face like yours anywhere, who are you?"

[Lunasola]

His eyes flicked over her curiously. Well, she didn’t seem like the unfriendly kind; at the very least, she hadn’t started chasing him away, or freaking out from his mere presence. His eye twitched at the memory of another encounter.

Lunasola wasn’t sure if Meryl was actually being rude or if it was his inclination to be annoyed at almost anything, but he found himself pouting at her question. Of course, nobody really knew anything about the feluis here – but he’d been here for years. They ought to know by now. “Lunasola,” he said, maintaining his unwelcoming and slightly snooty tone. “I live here.” …Yes, that was advantage he held, wasn’t it? He knew a fair amount about the castle in the time he’d spent here – places where he’d often see the same faces, the best places to lie undisturbed, and the times for dinner… His knowledge was vast in comparison to hers. He tipped up his chin in a superior manner. “You may ask me of anything,” he said. What a kind, generous soul he was.

[MerylStar]

She listened quietly as the feluis introduced himself, he seemed quite territorial at least, or perhaps it was just a custom for everyone to greet each other with such an unwelcoming tone. It didn't matter to her particularly, if people didn't want to see her she would make sure to stay out of their way. Being so small had it's merits, and learning to tread carefully was one of them.

"Anything?" She repeated, leaning forward, suddenly her interest had increased tenfold and her eyes widening eagerly. 'Anything' sounded like quite a lot to be knowledgeable about.. She wondered what to ask first, there were many things that she would wish to know about. After much silent deliberation, she had decided on a question, which was relevant to the task at hand.

"Do you know how to grow big?" She asked, lifting her hands into the air for emphasis. "I want to grow stronger and wiser." She figured that it wouldn't hurt to ask.

[Lunasola]

At the single-worded question, he gave a proud, definite nod. That's what he said, right? But as she continued, his expression quickly dropped. His jaw gaped in some attempt at producing words, but merely produced a baffled stutter. "Th-that's not what I...!"

Then he stopped himself. This girl had asked a sincere question in faith of his repertoire of knowledge. She was depending on him. How could he turn her away without an answer? ...  He knew the answer, right?  He rubbed his chin thoughtfully before responding. His chin was raised like he were the epitome of intelligence.  

"You eat! Lots! So much that you get really big!" He threw his arms out wide. "And if you read a lot, then your head gets big too, because it's so full of wiseness." He squinted at her curiously, tilting his head. "...You have a lot of catching up to do."

[MerylStar]

She listened intensely, hanging on Lunasola's every word as his vast sea of knowledge became at her disposal. He SEEMED confident enough.. so surely it was true.

Meryl glanced down as if to check that she really was as small as she thought. Of course, she was. "Hmm... You're right.." She tapped a foot against the ground as if doing that would help her grow a few inches taller.

She would admit that she didn't read quite a lot, and most of the time she lived off of whatever she could forage for.. So this theory wasn't out of the question, however ridiculous it may seem to one with some form of rational intelligence. "Alright!" She exclaimed suddenly, with a determined look on her face.

"I will eat all of the cake! And read the tomes!" She slammed a fist against the palm of her hand. She then turned her head and gazed at Lunasola very seriously, "Thank you!!" as was customary to do when someone offers you help, right?

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