The Salle, Friday afternoon

[future_sandworm]

Being a girl and looking like his twin sister was no excuse for not showing up to teach his students. In fact, it offered a wonderful opportunity to confuse them, one that Leto certainly wanted to make the most of.

He had picked two knives and were doing some drills, trying to get used to moving with precision in this body.

[very open!]

Comments

[glacial_queen]

Karla steeled herself and entered the salle. Maybe Leto had been spared. Maybe he'd be fine. And maybe, just maybe, she'd be okay with seeing him as a female. Maybe it wouldn't be too weird.

Riiiiiiiiight.

So Karla was a bit surprised when she saw Ghanima standing in the salle. "Lady Ghanima?" she asked, coming forward. "Did Leto send you--"

And then, as with Ender, she caught a bit of the familiar-but-not psychic scent. "Leto?!" she asked, shoulders slumping. "I hate this."

[And I, sadly, am for bed. Night!]

[future_sandworm]

"Karla," he said, smiling. "I should have known you could see through this. Too confusing for you?" He approached her, offering her a knife.

"But don't think this is an excuse to escape your lesson," he added with his best Ghani imitation.

[glacial_queen]

"Don't!" Karla said, almost flinching backwards. It was worse when he imitated Lady Ghanima's inflections and the like. "Just...don't. You're Leto, regardless of what form you wear."

Someone wasn't handling this well.

[future_sandworm]

"I am," he said cheerfully. "But I have a perfect opportunity to try and impersonate my sister."

He turned serious. "But if it troubles you badly I won't. What's the matter?"

[glacial_queen]

"This!" Karla said, waving at his body. "This is all wrong! There's more to gender than just a body. It's deep, it's intrinsic to who you are! It shapes and forms and molds you! You can't just wake up a female!"

Gender was a huge deal in Kaeleer. To suggest that it was something to be taken so lightly was messing with Karla's head. A lot.

[future_sandworm]

"Karla, I am still myself. I was born male. But you know I have the memories of my ancestors - including the female ones." He looked at her. "I seriously doubt it's going to last. So try to look past the image, and use your other senses."

He wasn't going to question her assumptions about gender.

[glacial_queen]

Karla glared a bit. "I know it's you! That's why this is so weird! This shouldn't happen, but since it obviously did, you should be different! But you're not!" Karla was groping for an explanation beyond 'No, no, no, this is wrong, I don't like it!' But fighting a decade and a half of cultural indoctrination was hard.

[wantstocheer.livejournal.com]

Claire entered the salle and blinked in confusion. "Lady Ghanima, it's a pleasure to see you."

[future_sandworm]

Leto smiled back. "And you too, Claire. Are you here for your lesson?"

Let's see how long it would take Claire to figure this out.

[wantstocheer.livejournal.com]

Probably not too long, since her boyfriend was currently her girlfriend and wearing her clothes presumably that will happen in the morning at least.

Then again, if Leto was really good at imitating his sister, perhaps not.

Claire nodded. "Yeah. I practiced some of the stuff you've been teaching us in Fight Club yesterday though."

[future_sandworm]

Well, he could probably imitate Ghani quite well, but the situation might give it away.

He nodded. "Show me?"

[wantstocheer.livejournal.com]

"Of course," Claire said.

She was wondering where Leto was. And why Ghanima was in the salle. But, she'd let it go for now as she demonstrated some of the strikes that they had learned recently.

[future_sandworm]

Those were good questions, really, but Leto wasn't going to offer any answers.

"Good," he said. "I can see that you've been paying attention." And he proceeded to give some suggestions and further instructions, doing his best to express himself in a way that Ghanima would.

[sorella-vecchia.livejournal.com]

Triela wasn't entirely sure why she'd shown up. It wasn't like she needed Leto's training.

Wait. Yes, that was it. She needed the training. That was a much better explanation than that she just wanted to see Leto. Right. Training.

[future_sandworm]

Leto looked at her. "Good afternoon, Triela."

He wondered how long it would take for her to guess what had happened.

[sorella-vecchia.livejournal.com]

"... good afternoon." Triela was relieved (not disappointed, dang it!) to find Ghanima in the salle rather than Leto.

"I didn't realize you worked out here," she said. Because Triela was totally a regular.

[future_sandworm]

"Well, I do." He did!

"How is your training coming along?"

[sorella-vecchia.livejournal.com]

"Rather well. Leto has shown me a few tricks." There. She didn't even hesitate before saying his name.

"I've been practicing." Practicing, at least, was something Triela was good at.

[future_sandworm]

"So, will you show me?"

He wasn't going to comment on 'a few tricks'.

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

Dinah had gotten home last night, crashed hard, and woken up, still portal-lagged and disoriented from the time-change and the big fighting-demons-denouement and everything else. Some eskrima practice sounded like just what the doctor ordered.

She blinked as she walked into the salle, and looked around. "Professor Atreides?" Was someone in trouble? ... was that someone her? "Hi?" she said, very cautiously.

[future_sandworm]

Leto turned around and smiled at her. "Hello, Dinah. How are you?"

Yes, he did try to sound like Ghanima.

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"I'm good," Dinah said, still thrown, and getting out her eskrima. "Did you get my message? About Fight Club? I would've called again, but I wasn't sure when we were going to be back until last night." She bit her lip. "Is something wrong?"

Ghanima seemed... off. Just a little.

[future_sandworm]

"No, nothing is wrong," he said, avoiding to comment about the message so as to not actually lie. "I hope you are safe, but I was a little disappointed you didn't invite me along." That last part was said with a smirk.

He spun a knife in his hand.

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"Ummm, well-" Dinah wasn't sure how to put 'it was all last-second and Tony's deal and you're a teacher and have obligations don't you?' but was going to try when the knife spun.

She blinked. And squinted hard. Waitaminute.

[future_sandworm]

Leto noticed her expression and smirked. "How is your training going?"