ᴘʀɪɴᴄᴇss ᴏғ ᴘʀᴇsᴛɪᴅɪɢɪᴛᴀᴛɪᴏɴ (cigam) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2016-03-24 18:45:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, edward elric, zatanna zatara |
Who: Zatanna & Ed
What: Running into her niece's maybe-boyfriend and inviting him for dinner
When: Last week sometime
Where: Magic Guild HQ
Rating/Warnings: Nothing, really - those awkward teenage feelings
Status: Complete
Ed wasn’t sure why he thought that going to the guild could cure his recent bout of boredom. It didn’t seem anything was lately. Since his hospitalization he’d felt restless and a restless alchemist was an annoyed alchemist. Basically everything he’d tried to transmute that day was uninspired. Finally even after his usual signature cannon of stone building he was out of ideas. His automail arm was starting to come around these days, but it still took some actual thought on occasion to get it to move the way he wanted. It wasn’t making alchemy an easy task. The blonde sat on the ground with a huff and looked around him. If Roy was there he’d have some fun, but unfortunately his commanding officer remained only to be seen in his dreams. It was a little annoying, missing people from them. A little pathetic even. He groaned and flopped down on his stomach instead, taking up a bit of chalk and just drawing in his space. His vast alchemy space. When Lina wasn’t in it, it was a little dull. Zatanna spent a lot of her time at Guild HQ - for upkeep of the space, and also to check on the wards and barriers, in addition to the glamour that shielded the space from prying eyes. Those with a ‘need to know’ were aware of how to actually get in, but otherwise, the location was certainly not advertised with a big sign. She was there today, restocking a few things in the potions room - adding stones, some more fresh herbs, and practicing on her own time as well; the goal was to become better at oil extraction so she allowed herself a few turns with the equipment since, generally, potion-making wasn’t her forte. There was also a matter of researching curses, and how to remove them - especially one of the Dark One’s caliber. Not easy. It was making her brain feel like fried eggs. But when she happened to walk by the alchemy room, she paused. “Ed?” Zee stood in the doorway, wrapping her sweater a little tighter around herself - it was a bit chilly sometimes, down in the depths of the Earth. “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize you were here. How are you? Everything going okay?” Ed glanced up from his chalk drawings that really didn’t resemble alchemy much. They probably weren’t. They were mostly doodles of nonsense. One happened to resemble Raven and a portal being awesome. “ Oh, uh hey. “ He hadn’t realized anyone else was there. “Yeah...just entirely uninspired.” He shrugged boredly as he sat up a little more and put the chalk down. Sometimes he got so bored he just ended up drawing. “Been like that all day. Frustrating really.” He grumbled, He thought maybe if he came to the Guild he’d have been a little more inspired, but he still had nothing. Zee arched a slender brow at the nonsensical drawings, although she was astute enough to recognize what was meant to be a pictorial representation of her niece. It was very cute - though she doubted neither Ed or Raven really knew much of what was happening in their burgeoning ‘relationship.’ Riza had hosted Raven for dinner, as a thank you for her assistance when Ed was in the hospital, and Zatanna had been hoping to do something similar - mostly just to have the boy over for the obligatory and customary ‘invite your significant other into our space’ thing (even if it wasn’t official between the two of them, not yet). She was sure that Ed would never do something so callous as to break Raven’s fragile heart, but Zee was protective of her anyway - someone had to be. Her father clearly wasn’t. “Oh?” She settled next to the alchemist scholar on the floor, sitting Indian style. “Would you like to...talk about anything?” Like the drawing, for example. No pressure. Ed was no picasso when it came to real art, he couldn’t draw a detailed version of Raven sitting on a flower bed or any crazy thing like that-but he was still pretty good for stick figures. “Hn? Talk?” He was a little slow when it came to complicated things like talking about his feelings. He didn’t even realize he had any, but as the picture displayed obviously he did. He was distracted at best these days, but entirely unsure as to why. Ed might be the smartest guy around with science, but with girls he was as dumb as a bag of rocks. “Talk? Oh, about this? It’s er, not...alchemy I know.” He felt a little flustered at that statement and couldn’t quite pinpoint why. “She’s my best friend...” He commented, not sure why he was saying that but he was pretty sure Zee already knew what it was. She smiled a little, bemused at the flustered words and actions coming from the teenager - that was such a whimsical time, wasn’t it? That age when you were embarking on your first relationship, your first date, your first - well, they could take most of those firsts slowly, it would soothe this aunt’s mind. And really, Zee was actually glad that they were traversing that path together, him and Raven. It was a rite of passage, and a nice break from all the angst and horror that seemed to follow them around like ghosts in Orange County. “I know,” Zatanna chuckled warmly. “It’s good to have that friendship there, as a foundation - but it might be something more?” she inquired. Raven had kept him sane during his recovery from the hospital recently, and several other times he’d lost track of. There was really no one else he’d rather spend more time around, except maybe his baby brother-but definitely not for the same reasons. The blonde thought about her words for a moment before giving her a confused eyebrow raise. “More? I..” Heat rose to his cheeks before he could stop it. Most of his life recently had been too busy to even think about girls. Now apparently Raven had invaded his doodles. “...I don’t know.” He stared down at the image for a moment and chewed his bottom lip nervously. “I don’t know.” He hadn’t even realized he’d said that twice as he picked up the chalk again to fidget with it. “Science I get...girls though…” He shook his head indicating his strong level of cluelessness. “Science is...well, it’s more based on rules. With other sorts of more personal life endeavors, I don’t think that’s the case,” Zee replied. “The good thing is though, with someone you’re that close to you don’t have to really worry about the rules - just be honest with each other. Let yourself feel that happiness.” She had no steps to follow, no perfect instructions like how you’d read a recipe to make the perfect cake - you just had to sort of stumble on your own, and live and learn. “If it helps, I am supportive of Raven and of you; I just want my niece to be happy and I know Riza feels the same when it comes to her own kin. I have been meaning to ask if you’d like to come over for dinner anyway.” Shifting on the floor a bit, she adjusted her long skirt over her thighs. “I do a lot of Middle Eastern-inspired cooking but it doesn’t have to be that - I can always just order pizza or something. Or whatever you and Raven feel like.” It was also an opportunity to get her and Ed together to maybe talk about things - Zatanna would give them privacy at the house, of course. Happyness huh. Ed wasn’t too sure it was as easy as that, but then to him letting himself feel happiness had been hard. Whenever he started getting okay with the idea with it something went wrong to take it away. “I’ll try.” Was the best he could come up with. For a long time he had to see a psychologist to try to be okay with things being good or happy in general. “I don’t exactly know what I’m doing here but..I’ll try.” “Really? I-okay.” Dinner with Raven’s aunt? Was it going to be dinner or was it something else? “If it’s edible I generally like it. Don’t have to stick with pizza. I’m easy.” He shrugged, there hadn’t been much by way of food that Ed found he didn’t like. “Just no tofu nuggets or anything. Tofu’s weird.” As long as he tried, that was the important thing - a lot had happened in Ed’s life, and he was still young. But he’d also been through a lot in that short amount of time. Hopefully now better things were on the horizon; you had to hold onto the good parts and let them be a source of strength for the bad. “Have you ever had it before? I bet I could cook it in such a way that you wouldn’t even know you were eating it,” Zatanna teased. She was of course a fan because it was such a versatile food - not to mention it absorbed the flavor of whatever you cooked it with, so it really depended on that aspect. “However, I won’t serve tofu - I don’t mind making things with meat, but Raven and myself just don’t eat much of it.” Or at all, in Zee’s case. Not because of PETA reasons - she just never had cared for the taste, and it wasn’t even very healthy for you anyway. “When would be good for you?” Ed made a face. “Yeah, I ate one of Lina’s ranky tofu nuggets.” He responded and cringed visibly at the memory of the nasty little bugger. “I thought she’d made regular ones, “Tastes like real meat” is probably the biggest lie anyone’s ever said about tofu ever.” If he’d known what it was at the time, Ed wouldn’t have even touched it most likely, but they looked enough like chicken nuggets for the kid to be fooled at first glance. “Other than that I’ll pretty much eat whatever.” Steak was his favorite, Japanese style steak to be precise. But he wouldn’t make anyone go out of their way for that. Steak was a messy thing to cook, he’d tried once. “On the weekends I don’t have any classes?” Maybe that would be easier than trying to figure out a weekday. Well, no, tofu wasn’t supposed to taste like real meat - whomever said that really had been lying. But it was a matter of preference, really. It'd been awhile since Zatanna grilled a good steak (she had Hawke handling all the grilling for the baby shower, for example) but she’d figure something out - there was little that the Mistress of Magic believed herself incapable of doing. It would be a delicious dinner either way. “Alright, how about next Saturday?” she suggested. “I’ll aim for everything being ready about seven, but feel free to come over whenever. I don’t think Raven’s working then.” Or going out on her patrols that she liked to do. He nodded to that. “Yeah, can do.” Raven had a job, Al had a sort of summer job helping with Riza. The brief thought of a job crossed his mind before it just as quickly made him wince and shake it away. Still, summer was coming. Maybe he’d poke Neal about working a bit more under the table at the ranch or something. Who knew. Ed added a couple more squiggly lines to his “masterpiece” before pocketing the chalk and dusting a bit of said dust he responded. “Yeah, I can do that. Al’s trying to get me to get a job but eh. We’ll see. For now though Saturday works.” He tossed her a piece of chalk. “Any good at drawing?’ And grinned. She chuckled softly, catching the chalk. “I will do my very best. There’s no better place to experiment anyway, I think.” Making arrangements for a ‘family’ dinner and alchemy - not what Zatanna originally came down here to the Guild for, but she enjoyed plans getting turned on their head sometimes. Made life interesting. |