With Great Power, Comes Great... Fun? [OPEN]

[Misaki Kobayashi]

The girl perching on the bench that overlooked the lake was surrounded by birds. She held a bird-feeder full of birdseed in front of her, while jays, magpies, hummingbirds, and nuthatches perched on her, the bench, and fluttered in the air.

Misaki smiled faintly at them. They weren't real, of course. But they looked, felt, and sounded real enough to her, as well as anyone who came within the vicinity. She was pretty sure that technically, she wasn't supposed to be practicing her power outside the school like this, or at least so publicly. On the other hand, it wasn't as if anyone would know she was using her power, so long as she did it right. And since she'd come to Hammel, she had learned a lot. At first her illusions had been constricted to sight, after all.

She held out a hand and directed one of the birds to land on it, testing herself as she probed the believability of its sharp little claws, the faint brush of its soft feathers, as well as the slight rush of air against her skin as it took off into the air again. Perfect. She smiled and got to her feet, still holding the bird-feeder, her only real prop, as the birds fluttered away and dispersed. That had been a good warm-up, now she just needed to find someone to practice on. The whole point of illusion was pulling it off without it being noticed as an illusion.

So, she wandered along the edge of the lake, in her bell-bottom jeans, Star Wars shirt, and pigtails, keeping an eye out for someone to try things out on. She caught sight of someone up ahead, someone sitting on a bench it looked from where she was. Perfect! She quickened her pace, quickly forming an illusion in her mind. Best to do something she'd practiced recently, so a bird. Bluebird. It would flutter around the person's head, they would feel the air from its wings, then land on their shoulder. Mildly sharp claws, sweet birdsong.

Deciding it was as close to perfect as possible, she paused. She was still far enough away that she couldn't quite tell whether it was a guy or a girl, adult or teen, since she was behind the person. But it didn't much matter. Taking a deep breath to steady herself and her mind, she reached out with her mind to plant the illusion in the person's mind.

[Colton Bryan]

Colton was sitting on a bench reading a novel when he heard a small fluttering of wings around his head. As he looked up he saw a bluebird circling around his head it then landed on his shoulder which caused him to think something was wrong since birds wouldn't usually come this close to a person. He decided to try and touch the bird. He brought his hand up slowly as the bird had begun to chirp its song to him.

[Misaki Kobayashi]

Well, the person hadn't seemed terribly startled by the oddness of the bluebird's actions. Interesting. Misaki directed the bird to remain on his shoulder and allow him to touch it, quickly organizing her thoughts for the illusion of its soft feathers. She was certain that her target was a boy at this point, she'd been able to determine that when he turned his head to look at the bird.

Curious to see how he'd react with more nature oddness, she put together a squirrel and two more birds, this time two jays. They materialized, and she directed them toward the boy. The jays made racket at each other, as jays liked to do, as they landed on the back of the bench next to the boy, and the squirrel hopped up onto the bench and chirred at him, holding a nut between its paws.

Misaki grinned. Sure, she'd probably have a headache later from all this, but she was used to headaches at this point. Her illusion work was well worth it. It was always interesting to see how people reacted to strange things occurring, and she liked to see them happening. It made it to feel as if she were living in a story herself.

[Colton Bryan]

When Colton's hand touched the bird its soft feathers felt real enough to him but he still felt something wasn't right about the bird. When more animals had come out though Colton became sure these animals weren't normal especially when a squirrel came and sat upon the bench beside him. Still he thought he should take advantage of whatever was happening at the moment setting his book down he reached out his hand towards the squirrel attempting to pet it slowly before watching the jays fly around for a couple of moments  He looked around and saw a girl a little ways behind him. To Colton it seemed like see was staring intently at where he was sitting. He then stood up abruptly and started walking towards the girl waving his hand.

[Misaki Kobayashi]

When the boy stretched his hands out toward the squirrel, it scampered promptly up his arms to settle on his shoulder and nibble at its nut. After sniffing his ear with its whiskered nose, of course. Misaki grinned a bit, thoroughly amused with the success of her illusion thus far. The boy didn't seem to be minding it much, either. In fact, he seemed to be making the most of it. Good! Everyone should feel as if they were in a fairy-tale sometimes, right? Life was droll without a little spontaneity!

As he rose and started her way, waving a hand, Misaki had to catch herself from letting the illusions disappear. Distractions always made them harder, though it helped when the target's mind had taken hold of the illusion and accepted it as reality. Which this boy's mind hadn't quite done completely yet. Ah well, hopefully she could change that soon. That was a major goal for her power: make it believable enough that people completely believed it. That was when the real fun could happen, after all.

She smiled as the boy neared. He didn't seem to be much older than fourteen or so... "Hey," she called to him. "The animals here seem to like you!"

[Colton Bryan]

"Yeah, I guess they do." Colton said when he was reached the girl. He assumed that she was the one making the animals on the bench act strangely, so he decided to play along for a little while, "These animals sure do act strange. I've never seen a squirrel come that close to a person before, and where I come from birds don't let anyone come close either, but maybe they act a little differently in this part of the country." When he finished he stuck out his his hand while he had started to talk he had switched into Japanese without realizing, "Anyway my name is Colton. Do you mind if I ask what your name is?"

[Misaki Kobayashi]

Misaki shrugged. "Maybe they do act differently from where you come from. Actually, it seems that a lot of animals that are in parks are more friendly than most." She offered a smile. Fond as she was of putting together harmless fantasies, if someone asked her straight up about what was going on, or confronted her directly, she would usually explain truthfully. However, he hadn't asked, and she saw no reason why he would. It wasn't as if she had declared she was a meta, after all.

When he began speaking in Japanese, her eyes lit up with recognition as she replied in kind. "You speak Japanese? I don't meet any people in the States who do. How long have you been studying?" She paused as she realized she'd completely forgotten to answer his question, and blushed slightly at the realization. "I'm sorry, I'm Misaki," she said quickly, still holding to Japanese. "It is a pleasure to meet you, Colton.

[Colton Bryan]

After he heard her speak in Japanese he realized he had spoken in another language without realizing once again. In response to her question he said in Japanese, "Actually I don't need to learn languages I automatically know all languages as far as I can tell. It's nice to meet you too Misaki." Colton still assumed that she was affecting the animals in the park some way but he decided wouldn't question her about it yet.

[Misaki Kobayashi]

Automatically knew all languages? Ah... so he very definitely was a meta then. And not afraid to make it know, apparently. Considering the fact Misaki hadn't seen him around the school yet, as well as the fact he was so free with acknowledging his power, she guessed that he was somewhat knew to Hammel. Ah well, she definitely wasn't one to scold someone about the possible dangers of telling people about one's meta-ness. Sure, PUSE was around to make things difficult for them. And sure, even some non-PUSE non-metas were suspicious of metas. But still, even though she didn't go around declaring herself meta, she didn't exactly go around lying and pretending not to be one, either.

"Sounds like a nice ability," she said casually in answer to Colton's declaration, glancing around as she did to ensure there weren't any possible problematic eavesdroppers. "How long have you had it?" she inquired, still keeping a casual tone. She didn't want the boy to feel as if he had to answer the question. Especially since at this point she was merely putting it to him to keep up polite conversation. Honestly, she wasn't quite sure what else to do with the conversation. She'd never been one to be good at small talk...

[Colton Bryan]

"I've only been speaking other languages for the last 2 weeks." Colton answered. If Misaki actually thought that Colton cared about what people thought of him she would be disappointed to learn that Colton hadn't cared about anyone's thoughts but his own for the last year of his life. He still wondered how she had manipulated the animals around the park, he decided that he had waited long enough and asked her, "Do you go to Hammel? If you do, do you mind if I ask what your ability is?" Unfortunately the language he was speaking had once again switched, this time it changed into Vietnamese.

[Misaki Kobayashi]

"Ah, so you're quite new then." Misaki smiled. "I hope you've been enjoying it." Powers tended to be hit and miss how inconvenient they were the first few months or so, it seemed. Her own had been mildly problematic, since she randomly caused illusions to pop up, and often had trouble figuring out what was real and what wasn't. Of course, she'd improved drastically over her seven years.

She tilted her head to the side when Colton began going off in another language. She wasn't sure what it was, but it sounded vaguely familiar. "Side effect of your power?" she inquired.

[Colton Bryan]

"Yeah, half the time I start speaking in another language with out meaning to. It gets especially bad when I start talking quickly." Colton said making sure to answer her question in English when he realized that he spoke in another language. "Anyway as I was trying to say. Do you go to Hammel?" He said restating his question.

[Misaki Kobayashi]

Ah, he was back to English again-- a language that she could understand. Not that it wasn't interesting to listen to foreign languages, but since he'd asked a question in the foreign language, it was less convenient, she supposed.

Misaki laughed as he asked about Hammel. "What makes you ask?" she inquired, still smiling. Sure, of course she would tell him. She had no reason to hide it, after all. But she was curious to hear his answer first. It wasn't often that she was asked if she was a Hammel student while walking around town. Or the lake, for that matter. Though since she already knew he was a student, that made it somewhat less odd.

[Colton Bryan]

"Something is making the animals over there act strangely," he gestured towards the bench,"and there isn't anyone else around who could possibly affect them besides you so I assume you go to Hammel and you have some ability to affect animal behavior." As Colton finished stating his reason for asking Colton glanced back towards the bench for a moment seeing if the animals were still there before he turned back towards Misaki and waited to see what her answer was.

[Misaki Kobayashi]

Well, wasn't he a skeptic. It was like he didn't even want to believe that animals could act like that naturally. Ah well, perhaps she'd been spoiled, or picked out targets a little more carefully in the past. It was more fun when they believed the illusion, after all. Though, she supposed that technically he had believed the illusion, in that he thought the animals were real. But he hadn't thought them unaffected somehow. Ah well...

Misaki grinned a little. "I've been at Hammel about seven years. Illusion," she explained with a single word. She glanced back at the bench when Colton did, where the animals had already disappeared several moments earlier. "It's a fun power."