collab:
@KaijuBaragon
So, Eira didn't get to sit in bed for very long, because she'd been forcibly removed and forcibly taken outside. She was still in an awful mood, and she whined the whole way to the place where fun sibling bonding activities were to take place. Where was that, exactly? The zoo. Nothing like gawking at animals after nearly being mauled by several animal-based quirks.
"Do we have to go? I'll jump out of this car right goddamn now.""No one asked you to get in to begin with. Quit whining, dipshit." The vast majority of the trip continued in this fashion, only interrupted by the occasional bout of silence, which never lasted for more than a few minutes. Though their words may have been harsh, and the squabbling barely stopped, there wasn't any real aggression in their words. Maybe this would have been hard to see for anyone else, but to the Winters siblings, this was just how it went for them.
Though she didn't want to admit it, Eira was having a pretty good time at the zoo. Her initial sour mood had cleared up pretty fast, replaced by a shy sort of excitement. They went around various enclosures (Aidan's favourite being the bat cave, purely because of how it had always freaked his sister out), minding their own business, until they got to the tropical birds.
Eira liked to keep herself to herself, and in turn, didn't tend to give much though at those she say in public. But there was a man standing in front of the exhibit, and he was so
tall that he couldn't even be called that anymore - he was just plain long. As they got even closer, Eira stopped suddenly. Aidan did too, giving her an odd look, but all she did was keep staring ahead with a strange expression.
“Aids. Holy shit, Aids, I think he’s even taller than you are,” she said, sounding much too entertained for something so trivial. Aidan was by no means short, towering over his sister by a good five or six inches, but this guy had to have at least couple of inches on him.
Dean continued to look down into the enclosure, considering where he wanted to go next, when he heard the sound of voices coming his way. He glanced over, not really giving it too much thought. Just a boy and a girl. He went to look back down or walk away, but then something clicked and he glanced back up. He was sure he recognised this girl… and when he remembered from where, he couldn’t help but smirk. What a damn coincidence.
He turned towards the girl as the two drew nearer.
“Hey, you attend U.S.J, right?” Dean was sure she hadn’t heard his voice at the factory - he definitely hadn’t said much.
“See, he heard you, idiot,” Aidan muttered to Eira, lightly elbowing her in the ribs. She gave him a dirty look.
“Shut up,” she replied, but there wasn’t any real malice behind it.
“And yeah, I do go there. Uh, do I know you?”If there was one thing Dean was adept at, it was concocting a solid lie.
“Ah, no. My brother works at that factory that got hit by those villains. Showed me a bit of security footage from the whole thing - he’s a big fan of the pro-heroes - thought I recognised you from it.” That sounded reasonable enough.
“Oh. Uh, sorry. Is he alright?” Eira replied, a little awkwardly. Her brother said something that sounded suspiciously like,
“You’ve got a fan now, huh,” though she opted to ignore it.
Dean turned away from the birds fully.
“Oh yeah, he’s fine. Luckily he doesn’t work in the halls, he works up in the security room. Otherwise he wouldn’t have lasted with that shark thing, or all those birds.” He put on a convincing sombre look.
“Those goddamn birds,” Eira scowled.
“Well, it’s all over now. Good to hear that he’s ok. Uh, well I think that we’d better be on our way now. Unless you’ve got anything else.” Dean looked like he was considering for a moment.
“No, nothing else. It was nice talking to you - good luck with the whole hero thing - you’ll need it.”Eira only nodded in reply.
“Great to chat,” her brother said, much more cheerfully.
“Now, Eira, where are the penguins?” With that, the two walked off, as though nothing out of the ordinary had happened.
Dean simply smirked as they walked past him, still totally unaware. So, now he knew Eira had a brother that she was close to. That could come in handy at some point down the line. But back to the birds. He was bored of the cassowaries now, having looked at them for a while. The eagles were nearby. So, off he went to enjoy the rest of his visit.
Honestly, Eira kind of forgot about the guy after that. It was nice to see someone who recognised her (and she would have to get used to it when she inevitably became a pro hero, of course), but she was so caught up in the rest of the trip that it slipped from her mind. The penguins were great, as was the rest of the zoo. Eventually, in a much better mood than the morning, it was time to go home.
"How was that, Elsa? Still want to jump out the car?""You're still here, so yeah."While she didn't explicitly say it, they both know she had a good time. And after the hectic day she'd had before, Eira finally relaxed.