Blue Boy and the Monk Who: Bee, Tomas When: October 3rd Where: The Infirmary What: Tomas arrives, and he is not happy to be missing his bear! Bee attempts to make him welcome. Warnings: Tomas! Open or Closed: Closed Observable: No
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Knowing what he should do very rarely caused Tomas to take that line of action. In this case, for instance, he was quite aware that he should wake quietly and try to get a sense of his surroundings before he made any sudden movements. He should find out who had captured him, and why, and focus on how to get out of the situation.
But Tomas wasn’t good at being rational or realistic. He was grumpy, and wanted his toys, and didn’t like that the place smelled like his work, or that he wasn’t wearing his collar, the old scar on his throat visible. He didn’’t like the idea that someone undressed him and took his things away, didn’t like the strange lump in his throat that he recognized as fear.
Tomas didn’t like to be afraid.
So when he woke up, he didn’t make an effort to be subtle, or to learn what was going on. Instead, he pushed himself up in the strange bed, a big pout on his lips, and drew his blue brows together.
“I want coffee and I want toys and I want to go home and I want something to eat, and I want to know who you are, and I really really want coffee. Or chocolate covered coffee beans. And Pooky. I know I went to sleep with Pooky, what’d you do with him? Did you bearnap him?”
His blue eyes focused on the man in the room with him, demanding answers. It was only afterward that he bothered to take in anything about the person, and then he realized that he looked young, perhaps no older than Tomas’s actual age.
Bee had been rather startled by the request that he greet this newcomer, and felt overall a little unprepared for the ordeal. He had been given an appropriate lecture, but...well. This was not home.
The deluge of questions did not exactly help. Bee blinked, then cleared his throat. “Peace. I’m afraid I can only answer one question at a time,” he told the other, and offered a small smile. He remained seated in the chair beside the bed, putting him on better level with the blue-haired boy.
“My name is Bee. I’m afraid I’m not the one who brought you here. Those who did asked me to greet you when you woke up. and answer the questions you would have. You have been drawn into another world, you see.”
The reactions to this news were always varied: Bee had broken it to several over his years as a guide to the travelers. He wondered how this young one would take it.
Tomas pulled a pout, just looking at the man for a moment. There was something so incredibly mature about him that Tomas couldn’t quite think of him as young, despite his initial impression based on his looks. The blue-haired boy took a long moment to peruse the unfamiliar features, and then started trying to work through understanding the words.
The words ‘other world’ didn’t really mean anything at all to him. That was something that people said about places that were different from what they were used to, or something people said about death, going on to another world. He had some idea that came from some religious thing or another, but his actual knowledge of such outdated notions was minimal.
He shook his head.
“I don’t get it. You mean I’m dead or something? Or I’ve been taken... where?”
“I have been told we are not dead,” Bee answered, promptly, with a slight smile. “You and I have both been taken from our own worlds and brought to this one.” He considered, then offered an illustration. “Like you would take a toy off the bed and put it in a box.”
"Oh."
Tomas thought about that for a moment, not saying anything at all. His gaze turned to his hands, as if the answer to his questions might be found there. The little pout didn't leave his lips.
"So someone just picked me up and moved me? But it wasn't you, and you're not from here either, but you were told to answer my questions?" He didn't pause to let the questions be answered; he was thinking aloud, that was all.
"Okay. So what am I supposed to do now? Is there coffee? Or candy? Is Pooky here? What's your name?"
He turned wide bright eyes on the stranger, though behind those eyes his mind was working at how very likely it was this young man was a trick of some type.
Bee chuckled. “I told you my name. You can call me Bee. There is coffee and candy, but I’m not sure about your teddy. The Scientists here have told me there’s work to be done to get home. You can choose how you want to work. They say it’s expensive to get home.”
Bee wasn’t entirely certain he believed it, but he was here, and here for a purpose. That he didn’t know exactly what that purpose was didn’t bother him in the least. He’d do what he could and eventually he’d find out what he was here for, or he’d be sent home.
Tomas blinked and flushed a little, as he realized that he’d completely missed some of what the man had said. He hadn’t realized he’d been given the name, and he’d rattled off so many questions he hadn’t caught what answers had been given.
“Oh.”
He went back to looking down at his hands, and for the moment, he felt honestly about as young as he’d been acting.
“What do I do then?”
“Well, what are you good at?” Bee asked, standing. He dusted off the seat of his jeans, and clasped his hand behind his back. His braid swayed across his T-shirt, the end dusting into the hollow of his palms.
“I’m currently doing some odd chores, cooking and cleaning. I may start working in the greenhouse, however - it’s something I’m more familiar with.”
Tomas frowned. He certainly wasn’t going to talk about what he was really good at. Not in a place that might be dangerous, in a situation that he didn’t trust.
He shook his head a little.
“I don’t know? I go to school with the other kids, and I’m good at painting, and I... can do some household stuff? I’m studying healing, but I’m just now starting...”
Lies, all lies. Or at least serious misrepresentations.
“We can find something for you to do,” Bee soothed. He chuckled. “If they can find something for me to do, then certainly they can for you. My skillet set, ah, it does not fit in well, here.” He spread his hands and shrugged, with an easy smile, grey eyes softly amused.
Tomas gave the man a long look, finally dragging his eyes back up.
“Why? What is it that you do?”
There was something in the man’s smile that made him want to actual ease up a little, but he wasn’t sure that could, just yet.
Playing the child tended to be a good plan, when he wasn’t sure what to do. At least if no one knew who he was.
“I’m a monk. Preaching, teaching, and healing isn’t exactly something they will pay me for, but it is my calling.” Bee chuckled and clasped his hands behind his back again.
That brought a look of confusion. Tomas had to root around his memory to see if he could even come up with a meaning for the word, and when he did, it was pretty vague.
“That’s... like a priest?”
He tilted his head, leaned in a little, and stared at the man.
“You do some kind of magic?”
He never had really grasped the difference between the religion stuff that people sometimes talked about - and the old paintings and sculptures in the church he lived in were evidence of - and magic.
“Ah, yes, very much like a priest. But no, no magic.” Bee answered, amused but patient.
“Huh.” Tomas leaned in a little more, coming up to his knees on the bed and crawling closer to look at the man standing by the bed. He looked ready to climb all over him in his curiosity.
“You’re interesting,” he declared.
“Probably why they chose me to greet you,” Bee replied, smiling. “They have your clothes and, hmm, pocket-items in a locker in your room. I can show you there, if you like.”
Tomas frowned, looking down at himself. The clothes he was wearing were strange, and not his color at all. He wanted his ribbon back too, to cover the ugly scar on his throat. A hand went self-consciously to the scar at the thought, but he forced it back down and then turned his attention back to the other man.
“Okay.”
There was something subdued in his tone, but as soon as Tomas started moving again, he regained his previous excitement. He didn’t simply climb out of the bed, but instead launched himself out of it, tumbling through the air and then landing with a flourish like a professional tumbler.
“Let’s go!” he cheered, bouncing toward Bee.
Bee spooked lightly to the side at the sudden motion, then laughed at the acrobatics. “Very well. Please follow me.” He smiled at Tomas and turned, leading to way past the curtain. His long braid swayed against his back as he walked, a heavy weight.
Tomas managed to watch the man walking ahead of him for all of a few seconds before becoming far too interested in his hair. He knew men with long hair - it seemed popular among certain types - but he’d never seen them wear it braided. He knew girls at home who wore them, but they were thinner braids, multiple ones, not one thick one.
He had reached out and playing with the braid before he bothered to think about whether it was okay or not.
Bee’s head tipped back on the tug and he twisted his head to glance over his shoulder, hardly missing stride. Seeing it was only Tomas. Bee continued walking, his easy ambling walk a good match for shorter legs. As long as he wasn’t actively going somewhere, Bee walked very slowly despite his long legs.
Tomas was careful not to tug hard enough to hurt, but he started to take little steps at different intervals, making the braid stretch out between them and then bunch up a little as he caught up. He started to giggle, as if he were getting away with something, despite the fact that he’d seen Bee look back at him.
He might be being indulged, but he’d take it.
Bee indulged the pulling - it didn’t hurt. If it had, well, he’d have put a stop to it But it was harmless, really. He paused in front of the elevator and poked the button, patiently.
Tomas suddenly got very wide-eyed, and he came up behind Bee so quickly he bumped into his back. He peered a little warily over the man’s shoulder.
“Um, buttons? In the wall? Do what?”
He hadn’t seen it turn a light on that he could see, and they were... standing in front of it and waiting. Some kind of security door? He’d seen those, but not looking quite like this, and he didn’t like the idea of going through big metal doors in a place he didn’t recognize.
“It’s an elevator. They don’t have stairs here.” Bee glanced back at Tomas, not minding the invasion of his personal space at all.
Tomas continued to peek over Bee’s shoulder, one hand on his arm as if to steady himself. He didn’t like not having any of his things on him, and wasn’t sure he could manage any particular magic without at least something to draw with.
Blood would suffice, but that was always dangerous.
He stared at the metal doors and wondered aloud, “But if there aren’t any stairs, that means no one can be punished by having to run up and down them, at least, huh?”
“Well, that’s true,” Bee mused. “Though I find it an inconvenient method of getting between floors, not having stairs.”
Tomas hopped from one foot to the other, then nodded. “It seems a little silly.”
Since he hadn’t yet been rebuffed, he wiggled his way under his guide’s arm from behind, one hand still reaching back to touch the incredibly interesting braid. Complete strangers who would let him crawl all over them were basically his favorite thing in any world.
“Is this world scary?”
Bee lifted his arm to accommodate Tomas. He looked down at the blue hair with some bemusement. “Well, no. Some of the people may be, but I think you get that in every world.”
The elevator doors opened, and Bee moved to gently extricate himself from Tomas.
Tomas frowned, but moved forward into the elevator anyway. He didn’t mind the small space itself, but the strangeness of it still got to him a little. He moved toward the little panel of buttons, then started pushing them at random, inquisitively.
“I suppose there are scary people everywhere,” he said offhand, as he did so. “Are there big scary monsters? Or government people who will drag you away and torture you if you’re bad?”
“Ah, no, we only need to push one. We’re going to the third floor, that’s where you and I will stay while we’re here,” Bee explained, patiently, and reached out to set his larger hands over Tomas’s, pressing them away from the buttons, his arms framing the boy.
It was strange for his hands to be bigger than anyone else’s, he thought suddenly. He had small, slender hands, like a woman’s.
Tomas didn’t seem at all upset about being stopped from playing with the buttons. He leaned back against the man behind him, casually, and tilted his head back to look up at him, smiling.
“You’re on the same floor as me? Does that mean I can come visit you lots and lots? You’re really nice. Most people yell at me by the time they’ve known me this long.”
It wasn’t really an exaggeration.
Bee chuckled and held steady. He cupped Tomas’s smaller hands in his own and playfully swung them to keep the boy busy. “Well, I took care of a lot of the younger ones in the monastery where I lived. It helps teach us patience, the brothers say. And yes, we will live on the same floor. You can come visit me when you like.”
Tomas swung his hands cheerfully along with the movement, making it a little wider each time, and then when there wasn’t much room to make the movements bigger, he started trying to make them faster.
He giggled for a moment, and then spoke again.
“There’s no one patient like this at school. Everyone’s always just telling me to shut up and sit down. I don’t like it much. But I could listen to you! I like the way you talk, it’s... soothing.”
He sometimes had to listen a little hard to understand the drawl, but he liked it. Now if he could just remember to keep up his story, he’d be fine.
The elevator opened at each floor. First, second.... Bee chuckled. “Well, sometimes it’s hard to be still. Especially when you’re younger, right?”
“It’s really hard to be still,” Tomas agreed, nodding very seriously. He peered at each floor as it was revealed, but the stops weren’t long, and he wasn’t going to bolt out for a real look with his new friend holding onto him.
When the doors opened a third time though, he started forward, still holding both of Bee’s hands as if he intended to drag him along behind him.
“Did you have a hard time sitting still when you were young too? I can’t imagine it.”
“When I was younger, yes,” Bee answered, and followed along carefully, trying hard not to step on Tomas. “Having to hunt for my own food helped. If you wiggle, you scare away dinner.”
“You had to hunt for your own food?” Tomas asked, his head whipping around quickly. It was an image he wouldn’t have immediately associated with the man, and surprised him a little.
Of course, the sudden movement while still holding onto Bee made Tomas trip himself up and start to fall.
“Whoop!” Bee loosed his hands and grabbed, and ended up bent over with an arm around Tomas’s waist. “Whew. Close one.” He grinned at the boy. “Yes, I did! I had my own circuit to ride, so when I was between towns I had to catch my food.”
Tomas took a second to steady himself, moving rather nimbly, and then laughed. “Thanks for saving me. I’m not always clumsy, just when I get too excited!” He’d already forgotten about jumping off the bed in front of Bee, too curious and trying not to show concern to keep track of things like that.
“So you were always a pri-” he started, and then corrected himself. “A monk? Even when you were little?”
“My parents gave me to the monastery when I was little, yes,” Bee answered, cheerfully. He started walking, then paused. “Oh! I’m forgetting my job. Ah, that’s the cafeteria over there, and the indoor training area over there....” He pointed.
Tomas was curious about that, but Bee was changing the subject, so he’d have to ask later. If he remembered, at least. His own parents hadn’t started to think about what to do with him - or at least where he could hear it - until he’d started causing trouble that they couldn’t ignore.
He wondered if Bee had been an unruly child of some sort, or if that was just how things worked in his world. Somehow despite Bee’s comment about having a hard time sitting still, Tomas was having a hard time imagining him any way but patient and kind.
The boy blinked as the cafeteria was mentioned, and started paying attention. “Cafeteria? Does it have coffee?”
“Ah, yes.” Bee blinked a little, train of thought derailed.
Tomas looked as if he might make a run for the door of the cafeteria, but then remembered that he needed to go to his room first and see about his things. So he drew in a deep breath, straightened a little as if facing something particularly difficult, and reached out to lay his hand on Bee’s arm again.
“Okay, what else should I see?”
“Well, we can get you a cup of coffee, then go see the rest? Since we’re close already?” Bee offered. No sense in making more trips than they had to.
Tomas blinked for a second, having just resigned himself to not having the coffee, and then burst into action. First, of course, he bounced up and brushed his lips against Bee’s cheek. Then he took off running for the doors of the cafeteria as fast as his little legs would carry him.
“COFFEE!” he was yelling, quite rambunctiously.
Bee blinked, then laughed helplessly and trotted after Tomas. Well, he’d be easy to find...
Tomas skidded to a halt though, not long after he made it in the doors. He tossed Bee a sheepish look over his shoulder and waited.
“Um, but I don’t have any money, obviously?” he asked, looking down at the scrubs he was wearing.
“Well, apparently this all works on the credit system,” Bee answered, as he came closer. He set his hand lightly on Tomas’s shoulder, and smiled a little. “So asking is enough, and they apply the correct amount to your debt.”
“Okay then.”
Tomas reached up and patted the hand on his shoulder, grateful for the support. Then he stepped up to the counter to order his coffee.
Of course, he didn’t do anything by halves.
“I want the biggest cup of coffee you have, and I don’t want any cream or sugar in it, but you can put some chocolate in if you have any. And I want a donut, do you have donuts?”
He bounced a little as he spoke, and seemed a little too excited over the idea of getting anything he wanted. But.... he glanced back at Bee. “I have to pay for this stuff, eventually, right? So I really shouldn’t splurge too much.”
“That is a wise decision,” Bee agreed, solemnly. Then he smiled, because Tomas was energetic, infectious, and adorably amusing.
Tomas nodded sagely, then ordered his coffee and donut. He shoved the donut into his mouth the second he got his hands on it, chomping gracelessly, and held his coffee cup carefully in both hands while he chewed.
He turned to look up at Bee just like that, donut hanging from his mouth and wide blue eyes trained on him, waiting for him to lead the way again.
Bee gravely took in the picture, then leaned over and grabbed a few paper napkins off the counter. He poked these into the handle of the coffee mug, then smiled at his handiwork and turned to lead the way. “The cafeteria’s open all the time. The drones aren’t always there, though, very late at night. Oh! The drones...you shouldn’t bother them. The head of the dorms will get angry.”
Tomas nodded, bobbing a little and started after Bee. He didn’t think he really needed the napkins, but the idea of being taken care of was kind of amusing, so he didn’t protest taking them.
Instead, he pressed for more information.
“So the drones can make all kinds of things? What are they? Those big robes are scary!”
“Are they?” Bee asked, with some surprise. He hadn’t thought of them as scary. In fact, the dark brown robes were very similar in cut and drape to the monk robes for formal occasions that Bee was used to. He hadn’t minded them in the least. “I’m not sure what they are. They are very helpful! And they make food and clean things.”
Tomas gave a very solemn nod, though the effect was ruined a little by him chomping down the rest of the donut before speaking again.
“Scary! You can’t see them so well, and they could be anything under that. What if there’s not even anything in the robes, like big holes in the middle of them? Or if they’re some kind of weird weapons hidden under there? Or some kind of fairy tale monster?”
“Oh. I hadn’t thought about it.” Bee kept walking, ambling along easily, feet bare and quiet on the floor. “There is something. They have hands...like metal. I don’t think they’re, well, alive like you and me.” Bee didn’t know how to explain it any better. He just knew what he knew, and that was that though the drones could follow orders, and think their way through problems obscuring those orders, it was all in a simplified manner. And anything that got stuck on a wad of lint was probably not alive and thinking anyway.
“Huh.”
Tomas considered that for a moment, then brushed his hands on the scrubs he was wearing, one at a time, switching his cup back and forth as he did. He only remembered the napkins through the handle of the cup afterward, and laughed awkwardly.
He stepped up close to Bee again and bumped his shoulder against him.
“But we’re not allowed to mess with them? So if I took it apart to see, I’d get in trouble, right?” He blinked, realized what he’d said, and then shook his head. “Not that I would if they were alive, or might be alive! That would hurt them. But I like taking apart toys, at home!”
“That’s true, so no, don’t take them apart. You don’t need to get into trouble. Gin Charlie is...stern.” Bee nodded. That was a good way of putting it, without being harsh. Gin Charlie was fair, but stern and occasionally heavy-handed with it. He was not cruel, but embittered, Bee thought. It was not always easy to be kind with a hurting heart.
Tomas nodded slowly. He took a long drink of his coffee, happy and cheerful, and then spoke again.
“I’ll be good! I don’t want to cause any trouble here. After all, I’m so little, and I don’t have anyone to look after me here. It’s not like being at school. I’m...”
He paused, and swallowed, hard. He wasn’t sure at this point - as was often the case with him - whether he was being honest or playing things up.
“Trying not to be scared.”
“It’s okay to be scared. It’s a scary thing that’s happened,” Bee told him, pausing at the door to the commons. He looked down at Tomas and smiled warmly. “Don’t worry. There’ll be a place for you here.”
Tomas nodded, peering around them and then sliding his arm around Bee, only to take it back immediately when the coffee in his other hand shook too much. Well, that answered the question about whether he was really afraid or not.
He flushed as he held the cup in both hands again.
“So, what else should I see?” he asked, a little more subdued than before.
Bee smiled softly and slipped his own arm around Tomas, pulling the boy to his side for a moment. “Well, this is the commons, through this door. That door over there leads to Gin Charlie’s office.” He pointed, keeping his voice calm and quiet as he talked.
Tomas nodded, fairly glowing with happiness at the affectionate touch. He was starving for it, though he hadn’t realized it until, well, this moment. He looked this way and that, taking in everything.
“Gin Charlie, is he the one in charge around here? The one you said would get you if you messed with the drones.”
He turned his eyes up to Bee, slowly. “Should I go talk to him? Not right this second, but later.”
“He is in charge. I think it would be wise to speak with him.” Bee nodded and smiled. “The dorm halls are here, through the commons.”
Tomas nodded, though there was a bit of real nervousness in the way he shifted toward Bee a little. He wasn’t sure that he wanted to deal with any authority figures if he could manage it. What if they knew about him somehow? Surely if someone could bring him here from his world, they would know things about his world as well, right?
He shivered and nearly stepped on Bee’s foot trying to follow him closely.
“Will you show me where your room is before you show me mine?” he asked, somewhat pitifully.
Bee chuckled a little as they passed through the noisy commons. There was a group loudly cheering on a Game, a group loudly gossiping over their knitting (not all were female, old, or even human), and a trio of small fairies playing a rambunctious game of tag through and around the commotion. A man with wolf ears, tail, and long canines was sitting in a chair and trying to read but looking quite disgusted with the noise-level.
Crossing the room without hesitation, Bee moved along steadily.
Tomas ducked his head, frowning, and cast glances around the room. He thought it was probably a bad idea to look this worried, but he couldn’t make himself do otherwise. He didn’t really know what to do about the situation, and that bothered him quite a bit.
He took another sip of his coffee to brace himself, holding onto the cup as if it were a lifeline.
“There are a lot of people here, aren’t there?” he asked, quietly.
“There are. There are five floors, and most of the rooms are full,” Bee answered, calmly, as he walked into the dorm hall. He padded down the hall, peering at name plaques. “I’m not sure where you might be placed...” he admitted.
“Oh, so no one told you?” Tomas asked, curious. He figured that if Bee had been tasked with coming to get him, then he’d have also been given information about where he was to be staying. Apparently that wasn’t the case.
The young man bit his lip, finally dragging himself away from Bee to check the plates on the opposite side of the hallway.
“It’s spelled T-O-M-A-S,” he said, as if that might be important somehow.
“Ah, I see.” Bee nodded, and paused by a room. he smiled and tapped the double-name-plate. “This one is mine, see?”
The plate Bee’s finger rested on read ‘Barnabas.’ Bee shrugged. “I have a room-mate, so knock first, okay?”
Tomas bounced across the hallway to look at the plate, reaching out to run his fingers over the letters.
“That’s a lot of letters for ‘Bee’,” he mused. It wasn’t that he couldn’t read or didn’t realize it was a nickname, but he had a hard time making the connection somehow.
He looked from the name to the man and back, and then shook his head. “I’ll be polite, I promise!”
“Well, it’s a nickname,” Bee answered. It had also been part of his original name, before he’d been renamed. He disliked being called by his proper name anyway. He rested his hand on Tomas’s shoulder. “Let’s see if we can’t find yours now.” He smiled at the boy.
Tomas stood there for a few more seconds, reaching out his hand and writing “Bee” over the strange long name with a finger, as if forcing the two to associate with each other in his mind. Then he gave a firm nod and turned look down the hall, in the direction they’d been moving.
“I wonder if I’ll have a roommate,” he said, starting to walk again, taking one side of the hall and checking each door in turn.
“I don’t know,” Bee mused, taking the opposite side of the hall, walking along easily.
“I FOUND ME I FOUND ME!” Tomas shouted, when he spotted his name. There wasn’t any other name to be seen, so he supposed that meant that he didn’t have a roommate. He wasn’t sure whether to be disappointed or relieved. Not having a roommate could be lonely, but then again... he was used to living alone. And how could he know that he wouldn’t be stuck with a dangerous person if he did live with someone.
Alone was definitely better, he decided, as he waved his hand toward Bee and pushed open the door, rather excitedly.
Bee winced at the loudness and came trotting over. “So you did! And it looks like you’re rooming alone.” He stood in the doorway, not crossing the threshold yet, watching Tomas explore the room.
Tomas went rocketing around the little room, peering into each corner like there might be some treasure to find. Of course, there was nothing. It was really a plain little space, lacking any personality yet, but there was a window, which was nice. He leaned against it to look out... and then remembered something and went running over to the chest.
He wasn’t really concerned about clothes, despite the fact that all he found was the bright blue pajamas he’d been wearing.
But the other two items... those were important.
He clutched a small brown teddy bear to his chest with one hand, while the other grasped a soft blue ribbon, the one that he liked to wear around his neck to cover his scar.
“POOKY!” He turned back to Bee, holding out the bear. “See, Pooky!”
Bee laughed - Tomas’s enthusiasm was catching. “I see! I’m glad he came with you,” he declared, bending a little to gravely examine the stuffed animal. “A very well-traveled bear indeed.”
Tomas grinned; it was so hard to find anyone willing to play along with him on things like this. He looked from the bear to Bee for a moment, and then the grin faded and he solemnly held the bear out.
“Can you hold him for a minute?” he asked, as if it were a very serious matter.
“Certainly. May I come in?” Bee queried, politely. It was rude to enter without permission, after all.
Tomas blinked up at the man. He’d been fairly sure the invitation was implied, since Bee had helped him find his room and everything. He stepped a little closer to the open door, reached the hand with the ribbon in it out, and tugged at Bee’s hand, pulling him in.
“Yes, please come in. And hold Pooky for me for just a minute, I have to do something.”
He pushed the bear at Bee’s hands, holding him carefully while he waited for the other man to take hold, as if dropping the bear would actually hurt it.
“Thank you.” Bee stepped in and gravely took the bear in both hands. He tucked the bear into the crook of his arm, securely, as he might hold an infant. Bear thus secured, Bee smiled at Tomas.
Tomas felt like his face was going to explode from all the smiling. It wasn’t that he didn’t smile on a regular basis at home, but somehow he hadn’t been around anyone who made him smile quite so easily in a while. He turned his face up toward Bee’s for a second, as if to show him, and then took a step back and turned around.
He kept his back to Bee as he took the blue ribbon and fastened it around his throat, making a knot in the soft fabric at the back of his own neck with a practiced motion, as if he’d been doing it for a while.
Bee watched with some interest - he’d seen the scar, but it didn’t seem to impede Tomas’s ability to breathe...or talk, or yell. He was not surprised that Tomas chose to hide it, either; not only was it not pretty but surely people asked questions.
Bee had not. There were things that were not meant to be casually asked about.
Instead he absently smoothed the stuffed bear’s ear.
After the ribbon was in place, Tomas turned around and reached out for his bear, smiling again.
“Thank you. I feel... better this way.” He made a face, showing his distaste over the scar. So far he’d been fine talking, but he was going to stress himself if he kept up the steady stream of chatter much longer.
“That’s good. I’m glad.” Bee smiled and returned the bear with care. Obviously it was important to Tomas. Bee knew things like that were important to children, especially when they were displaced. Not everyone had come to the monastery young as he had. He didn’t even remember his parents.
Tomas gave the bear a hug, then gently set it on the bed, turning back to his guest and twiddling his fingers a little as if unsure what to do now. He didn’t have any other toys, didn’t have any weapons, couldn’t think of anything to say in the moment.
Instead, he took a few steps forward, slid an arm around Bee, and leaned his head against him.
“Thank you for showing me around. Maybe... I think I’ll take a nap now before I try to figure anything else out. I’m tired.”
The cup of coffee that he’d left half-finished sitting near the door to the room hadn’t been enough to do much to him, and despite his excited bouncing, he really was tired.
Bee blinked, but returned the little half-hug, braid sliding over his shoulder and he craned his neck to see Thomas’s face beneath the shock of bright blue hair. “Alright. I’ll be outside for the rest of the day, I think. Cooter and I - Cooter’s my dog - we’ve been exploring the grounds.”
Tomas blinked at the mention of the dog, curious. He considered for a moment rethinking his nap, but he was really tired, and he shook his head to dislodge the idea. He gave Bee another little squeeze, and then took a step back toward the bed.
“I wanna meet your dog. Sometime. I like dogs.”
Bee nodded. “Certainly. He’s very friendly, he likes meeting new people. Now you go nap.” Bee fluttered his hands, as he might herd chickens or very small children.
Tomas smiled, nodded, and crawled into his bed. He thought for a moment about whether he’d be safe in his room, but surely his new friend would have warned him if that wasn’t the case. He gave a little wave toward the man as he settled down.
Later, he’d go see this Gin Charlie guy and find out how best to survive in this place. But for now, he had Pooky and a new friend and he’d be all right.