User blog comment:Doctor Ibrahim/Ask the Doc and his Family!/@comment-30014014-20180218051709/@comment-28358106-20180301042251

Lucida blinks in a cross-eyed way as the act is performed, but she otherwise doesn't move.

"...What is this supposed to do?" She whispers. "I don't..."

Then, she hears it.

It sounded nothing so much as when she would gradually turn up the volume on her record player during a particularly quiet aria, the susurrus of sounds weaving its way into her thoughts, pulling the singular puppet string of her soul. Like a hundred whispered conversations, only nothing quite so banal as what humans might say, or even think. This was quite different. It was the conversation of life itself, the gentle musings of a thousand miniscule hearts and their simple, sweet desires, to live life and live it well and nothing more.

Her ruby eyes swing back to Gladus, her mouth still open from sheer...well, shock. This was like nothing she could ever have imagined. Her still-very-young Golem mind had all but been flipped on its side, and now she was having to come to terms with the fact that everything she knew about fauna---which was considerable---might effectively be challenged for the rest of her life.

...That, and she was now beginning to see that maybe Gladus really was a little greedy. Her mouth curled into a smile as she awaited his thoughts, and how she might catch him unawares by letting on that she understood him now.

Thomas and Antoinette sit and listen in silence so as not to be rude, but it is clear that Alex has their undivided attention. They have settled in for a lengthy story, and aren't about to interrupt just yet. Antoinette in particular listens with rapt attention, as the potential for a romantic outcome seemed greater with every moment of Alex's story.