2nd Floor Common Room, Friday Morning

[bookbeltof_love]

Nina was on a quest!

A journey! An adventure!

There was a naked cat in the bedroom and she needed to find it clothes! There hadn't been any clothes that had fit the cat in the bedroom that had been within reach, which meant that she had to venture out and inspect other drawers and cupboards because the poor thing was going to get cold!

And everyone knew that cats didn't like hats very much.

(The naked cat had really not liked it when Nina had tried to put one on it, at least.)

The naked cat had refused to come with her (Nina had the scratch on her arm to prove it) and the friendly pink jelly blob had made funny noises at her and while she'd been giggling had rolled under the door and away.

Which was just another reason to go exploring! Maybe she could find the jelly blob and make friends with it? That'd be so fun--

But quietly.

If she was quiet, after all, she wouldn't be in anyone's way and no one would notice her and that would mean she'd be a good girl and her game wouldn't be stopped so she wasn't in anyone's way.

Nina poked her head into the open door and, seeing that no one was in there, tiptoed her way over to all the big drawers, ignoring the soft looking couches and the big black mirror things. She peered into the metal box with the handle on it and the metal bars inside of it and opened the humming box that turned out to have some food in it, though she didn't touch any of it because it wasn't hers and she didn't know what a lot of it even was and even the fact that she was able to read some didn't help her out.

What was mar-jar-in anyway?

She found a bag of rice in another drawer, once she'd abandoned the humming cold box, leaving the door ajar accidentally, and then a bunch of pots and pans, which made her think she wasn't going to find clothes in what might be a kitchen but, really, now that she was here she had to check all of them, right?

That was what adventurers would do! Right!

[Open, naturally!]

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[hashtag_chocobro]

Prompto had been on his way up the stairs, heading to his room after radio, already thinking about the work-out he'd be hitting up in a few as part of his new Friday morning routine, when he noticed a little someone there who probably shouldn't have been, trying to climb up the stairs himself.

"Oh, hey, there, Foomy, little buddy," he said, grinning down at him for a moment as he tried to climb his way up the stairs, before kneeling and holding out his hands to see if Foomy would come to him or if he's have to pick the jelly daemon up. And, since Foomy was in fact going to find Prompto, he happily burbled and leaped off the step into his hands. "What are you doing all the way out here? We better get you home, before Nina starts to worry about you."

And so he headed down the hall toward 221, slowing a bit to glance into the common room to see if anyone was up and about, especially after Foomy started burbling with excitement as he did. He paused, spotting the little blonde girl poking around the cabinets, and tilted his head with a thought, one that he felt Foomy's continued babbling was supporting as the daemons started squirming to be let down.

He considered the baby squirrels. He considered how it seemed to be Bring Your Baby Barista to Work day at the Perk. And then he ventured...

"....Nina?"

[[the Foomster totes modded with permission, too, bros! ]]

[bookbeltof_love]

And, really, it probably said a lot that Nina's first reaction to a big kid-maybe-an-adult voice was to recoil from the cupboard—she wasn't sure if she was, like, allowed to be in there after all—before she even looked to see who the voice belonged to.

"I'M BEING GOOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" she protested, looking up anxiously, since they already knew her name and, in Nina's experience, that was rarely a good sign unless she was in the library or the kitchens.

[hashtag_chocobro]

"Ohthankgod," Prompto gushed out, sinking just a little with relief. Not about the whole being good part, but because that was absolutely definitely Nina, he was sure of it now, which meant that the island was doing the whole 'turn everyone into kids' thing again, and it had actually (somehow!) skipped his sad, chubby butt this time around!

But not so much Nina, apparently, and, even if it weren't for the rush of relief, he would be pretty stinkin' amused by that and had to chuckle a little, setting Foomy, who wasted no time in burbling and rolling toward Nina, down.

"What'cha looking for?" Prompto then asked, grinning at her a moment before going to kneel in front of her and inspect what she was up to.

[bookbeltof_love]

She studied him, big blue eyes curious, before her attention got sidetracked by the happy pink blob.

"YOU'RE BACK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" she said happily, offering the guy her strainer so that she could pick up the blob. "AND YOU BROUGHT A FRIEND??????????????????????????????"

From the way the blob was very excited then, like, that seemed likely?

[hashtag_chocobro]

"I found him trying to get up the stairs," Prompto offered, and now he had a feeling he knew why, and was contemplating suffering Nina's wrath later by treating him to a tiiiiiny little bit of peanut butter later for being such a good, smart little daemon.

Good, smart little daemon. There was a helluva phrase!

"I'm Prompto, by the way," he added, since, yeah, definitely with the whole regression in time with memories thing, too.

[bookbeltof_love]

And he was still streaked from the last time he'd gotten peanut butter! Honestly, Prompto! You were a menace.

A menace who'd basically been voluntold to babysit by a jelly demon admittedly…

"M'Nina," she said, a little bit shy at a big person, like, actually talking to her and not telling her to go someplace else or do something. "I'm on an adventure for CLOTHES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

In a kitchen cupboard.

[hashtag_chocobro]

"In the kitchen cupboards?" Prompto asked, unconsciously echoing the narrative and laughing a little. "I don't think you'll find much for clothes in there, Nina, not unless you're looking to put together some nice cookware armor or something. Which would be adorable, but if there's nothing in your room that fits, we could just go into town and buy you some at the clothing store."

Please, please, PLEASE let him buy you a stupid amount of adorable clothing at the clothing store, little Nina!! OMG.

[bookbeltof_love]

"I ONLY GET NEW CLOTHES ON MY BIRTHDAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Well. Mostly. She only got nice new clothes on her birthday.

Nina giggled and set the jelly blob on the floor so she could better lean into Prompto, like she was telling him a secret.

"They're not for me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" she explained. "They're for the naked cat in the room!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

[hashtag_chocobro]

Prompto may have winced just a little, because, wow, that was a LOT of loud coming from such a tiny little person, but, also, it was Nina, should he really be surprised?

But the reveal of who the clothes were for made him laugh again.

"A naked cat??" he asked, sounding equal parts scandalized and amused. "Oh no! We can't have that! But I don't think there's any cat clothes in there either. But, you're actually in luck, because I work at a pet place! And not only do we have cat clothes, but my really good friend Sidon is working there today, as well!"

Errr, at least, maybe he was? Prompto blinked, realizing that Sidon might be kid-ified today, too...

"Err, well, most Fridays he does. But we can go see and go solve your naked cat problem all in one!"

[bookbeltof_love]

"AM I ALLOWED???????????????????" she asked, not sure if………..

"I'M SUPPOSED TO STAY ON SCHOOL GROUNDS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Well, yeah, that way they could at least pretend to keep an eye on their wayward, toddling orphan that no one really parented!

And also she didn't want to get in trouble and Prompto was pretty big. He'd totally get them caught.

[hashtag_chocobro]

OHGOD THE YELLING.

"Shhhh," Prompto put a finger to his lips and lowered his voice softer as hopefully an example, "inside voices, Nina, since we're inside. And, yeah, it's okay, you're totally allowed..."

PAAAUSE, as he remembered who he was talking to.

"...as long as you have a responsible big brother person like moi with you, okay? But if you feel better staying here," which he'd be totally fine with her feeling, because, yeah, YEAH, let's not think of the terror an unsupervised weetiny Nina could wreak on the island while unsupervised, "I can just go myself and pick something up nice for the cat, but it'd be more fun if you could pick something out for her, don't you think?"

[seriesofbaddecisions]

"Pew pew," Sabine greeted him, pointing her spatula blaster at him.

...Nothing personal, Mandalorians started early.

[hashtag_chocobro]

And, just like that, this weekend went straight from Prompto's absolute nightmare from last year's experience to being pretty much the best this year now that he himself wasn't all wee and tiny.

(Okay, well, maybe not so tiny...)

"Oh no!" Prompto declared, clutching his chest as he staggered back dramatically. "I've been shot!"

He continued to suffer from this grievous wound until he'd reached the couch, backing up into the armrest and tumbling over onto it in a flail of legs and arms, which then went limp and still as he let out his last groaning breath.

[seriesofbaddecisions]

"Are you dead?" Sabine asked him.

She was pretty sure when you got shot you just fell down.

[hashtag_chocobro]

Prompto....wasn't sure if he should just keep playing dead at this point or actually answer her.

So he just sort of held his position sprawled out on the couch for a long moment before venturing, "Yes. Yup. Totally, one-hundo-percent dead."

He even groaned again and rolled out his tongue to prove it.

[seriesofbaddecisions]

Sabine considered that, and decided, "Then I hope you learned your lesson!"

What lesson was that? Who knew.

[hashtag_chocobro]

Whatever it was, it was dutifully earned, and that hard way, too!

Prompto nodded. "I did. Thank you. And really nice shot, too, by the way."

He lifted up a totally-corpse hand for a high-five if she'd take it, while he tried to parse out who exactly this might be and coming up with a pretty good idea, he felt.

[seriesofbaddecisions]

Sabine gave him a high five, or at least slapped at his hand.

"Thanks. I'm a really good shot. Wanna help fight enemies?"

[hashtag_chocobro]

"Well, yeah!" said Prompto, snorting a little as he gave the little girl his best super-obvious look. "Duh! Who doesn't? What kind of enemies are we fighting?"

[seriesofbaddecisions]

"Bad guys," she said, like this was obvious. "In-sur-gents."

She didn't know what that meant yet.

[hashtag_chocobro]

Ohmygod. How come everyone else got to be super-cute when they were little, but Prompto had to be...ugh, him when he was little?

"Bad guys," he repeated, nodding a confirmation. "Insurgents. Got it. Except...hey, you got another gun? I left mine back in my room." He hitched his thumb upwards toward the ceiling, so she could get an idea of just how far away that really was!

[lilac_eyed_lieutenant]

So far, as far as getting tea went, this person seemed Tisarwat's best bet, since the other kids were all even smaller than her! But there was one very important question she needed answered before anything else.

"Oh, no," she gave the grown-up big, wide, worried eyes. "What happened to your gloves?"

But at least he was wearing some! But she guessed it wasn't as bad if really little kids like these ones were wearing any. She gave hers an important sort of tug.

[hashtag_chocobro]

"What?" asked Prompto, frowning a little as he lifted his hands and inspected them. "My gloves? Nothing, they're how I always wear the--"

Then his brain sort of caught up with who this might be.

"They're supposed to be like that," he offered instead. "They help me work with stuff like my computer and guns a little better.

And they covered up super awkward clone barcodes!

[lilac_eyed_lieutenant]

"Supposed to be?" Tisarwat recoiled a little, wrinkling her nose, looking at the grown-up dubiously. "It looks tacky. You don't go out with your gloves like that, do you?"

[hashtag_chocobro]

"Tacky?" Who was this little scamp coming in here and telling him his gloves were tacky, anyway?

Well, Tisarwat, was his best guess, even if her eyes looked different, but he'd seen her giving little judgy looks at his gloves all the time, and out of the mouths of babes.

"I'll have you know, where I'm from, my gloves are very stylish and fashionable. Not all places have the same rules about gloves, you know."