Look! A New Friend! [Arlo]

[Jean Manne]

Ah, soccer.

It was Jean's real love, really. Soccer was just so much fun; you got to run around and make new friends and kick around a soccer ball. What more could a hyperactive twelve year old boy want in the world? And it was far nicer than homework. Ew, homework.

It was cold that day, so Jean opted to play around in the indoor field. Which... wasn't so much an indoor field as it was a half-hearted covered area of the training field. At least it was warmer.

He aimed a particularly hard kick at the black and white ball and sent it spinning towards another boy, who looked around his age. Jean beamed at him. "Hey!" He greeted the other boy, "Wanna kick the soccer ball around with me?" He jogged closer to the other boy, "I'm Jean!"

[Arlo Pecatti]

For once it was a cold day in the United States and Arlo had opted to remain inside. Whether it was normally cold or hot though, Arlo didn't really know. He preferred it when it was cold though. He felt a lot better about going outside in general. He liked the weather there because it seemed varied. He got bored of similar things all the time.

That day he had meant to go to do his homework but instead he had decided to go for a walk because the temperature wasn't so hot he would pass out and although it was cold, he was sure he would find something more active to do to warm himself up.

Just as he was looking for something to do, he found himself in an inside soccer field with a ball headed towards him, followed by a boy. A boy that looked about his age. Arlo nearly jumped for joy at having found someone his own age for once, especially given that he seemed to be talking to him.

"Hey. Yes, soccer ball kicking around sounds good," Arlo responded, hoping his sentence made sense given that he had repeated what the other boy had said. "My name is Arlo," he introduced himself, stopping the ball with his foot and smiling. It had been a while since he had played soccer. He kicked it back in the direction of the other boy, wondering if this could be a new friend at last.

[Jean Manne]

Jean grinned, catching the ball with his foot. He noticed the other boy’s accent. “Hey, you’re not from around here, are ya?” He tilted his head curiously, “Where are you from? Is it far away? What can you do powerwise?” He asked, barraging his new friend with any question that popped into his head. It didn’t occur to him that Arlo might need a little time to process each question. And besides, Jean would be perfectly happy to repeat himself.

“So do you play soccer?” Jean asked, “It’s my favorite sport, but I play other ones too, if you like other sports better.” Jean didn’t really mind, he was just happy to find a friend his age.

“How long have you been here?” The preteen asked finally, “I’ve been here about a year now, so I don’t know everyone yet. But Hammel’s a pretty cool place. You can take fun classes and the teachers aren’t too boring. Maybe we have a class together!” Jean brightened at the prospect.

[Arlo Pecatti]

While Arlo didn't catch all of the words, he caught enough from the first question to make sense of it and form an answer. "No. I'm Italian. I only lived in America for one month and then Hammel stole me from my brother," he laughed a little. It had essentially happened like that though. One minute, he was lying on the kitchen floor with a paramedic asking if he could hear him, the next thing he was with a Hammel official and he hadn't seen his brother since. He did feel somewhat kidnapped, although he liked it there so he didn't mind too much.

He had pretty much missed the next question all together but heard the word 'power' and knew what that meant. "I'm heat resistant," he replied, passing the ball back to his new friend. At least he hoped they were friends. Or, well, they could be friends. They didn't know each other really yet. "What's your power?" he asked. He found his English came easier to him with people his own age and it seemed he was understood so far. At least he hoped so. And he hoped he understood the questions as well. He certainly had a lot of them!

Arlo shook his head a little at the soccer question, "Before when I lived in Italy I.. Er.. Well, my parents, they not liked sport so I never played any. But now in America my brother said I can play them. I like soccer, I think," he nodded a little. He didn't know of many other sports really. He had heard of the main ones but none particularly stood out to him. And it hadn't even been that his parents didn't like sport at all. It was that they didn't like Arlo doing sport considering he had problems with his immune system from a young age and they didn't want to make it worse. Arlo wasn't overly bothered by it though and tended to put it down to his powers more now, although that wasn't always what caused it. "What sports you like?" he asked, unable to think of the names of many more in English and hoping Jean might provide him with a few names of sports. He could read about them some time when it was too hot to go outside where everyone else was.

At yet another question, Arlo smiled. It was nice to know Jean had a lot to say so Arlo could use his questions to base his own sentences from. That would make communicating significantly easier, that was for sure! "I come here maybe two months before now?" he responded with a small shrug to show he wasn't entirely sure. "I still get lost," he added and laughed to himself, wondering how long it would take to get used to that place. "What classes you like?" he asked. If they shared interests other than soccer, then maybe they would be able to spend more time together and become better friends. Arlo had never had a best friend before, unless you counted his pet spider, so he quite liked the idea of having one.

((That was longer than it looked :/ sorry XD I don't mind the length of replies though. I just write until I run out of things to say so don't worry if the reply isn't as long as mine was. I just got carried away XD))

[Jean Manne]

Jean looked at Arlo with wide eyes, “Wo-ow, you’re from Italy? That’s so cool.” He grinned back when Arlo mentioned kidnapping, but felt compelled to ask, “But you like it here, right? I mean, are you having a good time and stuff?” Jean felt it was pretty important to like where you were living. He couldn’t imagine not liking Hammel, but if you didn’t, he could see how that would be really hard. “I have brothers too. Lots of them.” He laughed, “And some sisters. RC and Conrad go here. Well… RC goes here. Conrad is a scientist. A researcher.” Jean puffed his chest out a little in pride. He had a pretty cool brother. “He helps me with my homework sometimes.”

“Oooh heat resistant? Bet that comes in handy in the summer. Er… wait, does that mean you don’t sunburn?” Jean didn’t have a broad knowledge of metapowers. He passed the ball back to his new friend, considering the question of sports. “Umm… Well, soccer’s my favorite. Oh! I hear they call it football in Italy. Which actually makes way more sense, since you’re kicking a ball with your foot. So…” Jean shrugged, considering this curiosity before moving on, “I also like baseball. But I’m not as good. And I’m too short for basketball, I think.” He pouted briefly. “But I can teach you, if you want,” Jean volunteered with a grin. Playing sports with a dude his age. Excellent~

“Oh! My power is alchemy.” Jean said proudly, “I can change metals into different metals. I’d show you, but I left my metal-rock in my backpack.” Soccer shorts didn’t have pockets. Because they were lame.

“Wow so you’re still new.” Jean observed, “Oh dude, it is so confusing here all the time, I get lost too. It’s like Hogwarts or something. But cooler ‘cause, you know, metas are better than wizards.” Jean was a little on the fence about this belief, since this opinion more or less changed with the weather, but today he felt it to be true.

“Umm…” Jean squinted, trying to think of a good class, “Well, I’m taking this auto class which is pretty awesome. And I’m good at science. But most of my other classes are normal and boring. My power training class is cool though. Even if it is a lot harder than I thought.” He kicked the ball towards Arlo, “What’s yours?”

[ooc: sorry for the wait >_<;;]

[Arlo Pecatti]

Arlo smiled and nodded. Italy. He loved Italy. He always had loved Italy. Every time he had left the country and gone elsewhere, he had wanted to return home. Sure, America was great, but Italy would always be his home. He slowly nodded, "Well, yeah. I like it. But Italy is home. This place, it feels less like home," he said, unsure of how else he could explain it. "I think I miss the family the most," he added. It was strange being there without any family. When Jean spoke of RC, Arlo smiled again, "RC is in my dorm!" Then hearing the other name, he didn't recognise that one but he had a feeling he would do some time. "Conrad, he sounds cool," he said with another smile. He felt like he could smile a lot with this boy. "You are close to your family?" he asked, although he had a feeling they would be close. "I have three sisters and two brothers. But I'm the only one here," he frowned a little. It had never been proven that he was actually his father's son so he wondered if that could be something to do with the fact that he was different? Probably.

Arlo smiled at the question and nodded slightly, then added, "Yeah, but if it comes out too powerful then I pass out," he laughed a little. "That not so fun," he stated. He hated ending up in a hospital bed. He had spent too much of his life in one already. "But I can cook food and not be hurted by the oven being hot," he smiled at that idea. He loved cooking so that was clearly going to be useful.

Arlo stopped the ball with his foot again - or at least tried to, seeing as it went right over his foot and Arlo had to chase it. He passed it back to Jean and then jogged closer again so they were back in talking distance of each other. "Yes, soccer or football, it is good," he said with a smile. "Baseball?" he repeated, trying to remember which sport that was. Base and ball made it sound like either you took a ball to bases or you did something to the ball to get to a base. Was it like cricket? Maybe. He understood basketball better though. Put the ball in the hoop, basically. That didn't mean he could do it though. He was too short as well. "We should make a team for short people!" Arlo suggested, grinning. He liked his own idea there.

"Wow," he said, wondering what it would be like to change metal from one type to another. "You could make money into more expensive money! Like from one cent to five cents or something!" he laughed. That would be pretty cool. He wouldn't want to cheat the government out of money but, well, if you needed a dime or quarter or something specific and didn't have it, it could be useful. But probably hard to do at the same time.

Arlo laughed at the mention of Hogwarts, "Well, I hope the staircases not moving?" he asked, thinking that would have actually made the place a lot better than it already was if that happened, although he would be forever getting lost. "How are metas the better ones? I suppose they are masters of one power where wizards know many..." he shrugged. He would have liked to be able to do a lot more than just pass out if he got overly hot and didn't realise it but then every power was different.

"Science? I like science too. But what is auto shop? I didn't have that class." He had never even heard of it before, actually. Which was surprising given that he had been there for a few weeks now. He had expected to know most of the classes at least but that one? Well, he had no idea. "What you do in power training?" he asked curiously, wondering how to train metal changing. That sounded strange. "I've not trained yet as my medication for an illness related to the power is being shipped from Italy," he laughed a little. He had refused to train unless he had medication because he didn't want to end up alone in some American hospital or anything like that.

((No problem! I've not been on much anyway so it's fine!))

[Jean Manne]

Jean considered Arlo’s words. He couldn’t even really imagine what it would be like to not have his family around to hang out with him or bother him or support him. He could see how Arlo would be lonely. When Arlo mentioned that he was rooming with RC, Jean perked up, an idea occurring to him. “Hey! You can just hang out with us! You already know RC and Conrad is super cool so you could kinda be sorta like another brother and stuff!” He thought that sounded like a pretty good idea. And he liked having brothers. Having more brothers seemed like an awesome idea. “We could be like… a substitute family. ‘Til you go and see your family in Italy!” He looked at Arlo, waiting for approval or disapproval.

“Ohh…” Jean nodded, “Yeah, I get nauseous sometimes if I work with heavy metals. I…forget what those are.” He admitted a little sheepishly, “But I know that if I work with them too much I get super sick.” He was supposed to be memorizing the heavy metals for power training but that was so boring. “I can cook too!” Jean said proudly, “Kind of! I can make, like, pasta. It’s really good pasta.” At least, he thought it was. And Conrad assured him that it was tasty. “Oh, that’s awesome. I burned my hand once, it sucks.” Jean grimaced in memory.

Jean nodded, “Yeah. Baseball’s the one where you hit the ball with the bat and run around the bases.” He mimed hitting an imaginary ball with a baseball bat. “It’s fun. And sometimes you get to slide in the dirt. I only played one season though, because I twisted my ankle.” He pouted a little bit in memory. He probably would have been fine, but no, his mom said no baseball for a while. Jean laughed, catching the ball with his foot, “Dude, we totally should make a team for short people. It would be awesome.”

“Man, I wish.” Jean sighed at Arlo’s assumption, “Nah, my trainer told me if I did that I’d go to jail or something. Even if I changed a penny to a dime. That, and it would still be shaped like a penny. So it’d look like a silver one cent coin.” He shook his head regretfully. It was quite a shame.

“Oh man, I hope the stairs don’t start moving.” Jean laughed, “Man, could you imagine? We’d get lost like all the time. Talking pictures might be kinda cool though.” He shrugged thoughtfully.

“Science is cool, what kinda science are you takin’ right now?” Jean kicked the ball back to Arlo, “Auto shop is super awesome. We take apart cars and things.” Okay, so maybe they didn’t take apart cars yet, but they were going to. And that was what mattered. “Power training’s fun. I have either a science-y lecture about metals and their properties, and that’s super boring, but then there’s a fun one where I focus on turning metals into different metals with my brain. It’s kinda hard now, but it’s gonna get easier.” That was what his power trainer told him, at least. Jean hoped it was true.

The twelve year old tilted his head curiously, “What’s your illness?” It didn’t occur to him that Arlo might not want to talk about it. Jean could sympathise with illnesses though.

[Arlo Pecatti]

Arlo smiled at the idea of hanging out with the rest of the Manne's. That sounded like fun. "How many of you are there?" he asked curiously. He didn't mean for it to sound rude, he just wondered if his family was a similar size to Jean's more than anything. His own family was huge but they didnt exactly know each other well. It seemed Jean's was more like what a real family was like. "One day you should meet Silvestro. He's my brother that lives in America at the moment," he told him. "I think he would like to know I have friends," he grinned. He liked the idea of a substitute family. It sounded like fun.

"Heavy metals?" Arlo asked, a slight frown on his lips. "But those sound like the more fun ones," he laughed. It would be annoying not to be able to use the metals you wanted to use. Although not being able to cook was pretty annoying for Arlo too. "Pasta?" he repeated and smiled. He liked pasta. "We should cook together one day. When they let me go near ovens again," he laughed. He hated not being allowed to cook.

Arlo nodded at the idea of baseball. "I think I saw that on TV once," he smiled. He didn't know the sport too well but hey, he could learn, right? "When you can play again?" he asked him because he liked the idea of trying to learn the sport somewhat. "Short people make the best teams," he stated. They had to work together to get to bigger things after all so it would make sense that short people would need to work together to get things done.

Arlo frowned at the idea of changing money not being acceptable, "Well... What if you changed a dime to a cent? So the smaller currency was the new one?" he asked, although that made no sense because why would you want less money? "I guess normal metal might be better though, like with making things," he said with a slight shrug.

Arlo laughed, "But if the stairs did move, we have a reason to be late at least," he commented given that it was really necessary for them to have a reason for being late. Just being late didn't seem to make the teachers any more sympathetic.

"I like chemistry. It's like cookery," he smiled at Jean. "So I take chemistry. Is that what it is called here?" He didn't even know what it was called. That was bad really. He should have at least known his own subjects. "Wow, auto shop sounds cool," he commented. He liked the idea of that. It sounded really fun to take cars apart. "I need to do training," he commented with a small frown. "Is it fun?" he asked. He understood it would be hard at first but he wanted to know it would be fun when it started at least. He would be starting his training soon.

Arlo smiled and shrugged a little, "I don't know what it's called in English. But if I get ill then I can't get better properly like other people. I was born with it apparently, but it didn't actually effect me until I was 4 years old," he shrugged. He didn't know a whole lot about it, just that he often passed out for no real reason just because he had a cold or something. Normally more serious than that though given that he did have tablets to help build immunity.

((Sorry for the late reply. ooc stuff got in the way :/))

[Jean Manne]

Jean returned Arlo’s smile with a grin of his own, “There’s lots of us! There’s me, my big brother RC—he goes here. There’s my biggest brother Conrad, who used to go here, there’s my sister Velma, who’s a teacher, and Mark and Roger, who are twins, and my baby sister Elle, who’s four. But they’re at home. They visit sometimes, though.” It didn’t occur to him to mention that Velma was deaf or that Elle had Down Syndrome. Those kinds of things slipped past him simply because of his upbringing. “Yeah, that would be cool! Your brother has a cool name.” Silvestro was an awesome name. His name was nowhere near that cool.

“I know.” Jean sighed, “And they look cooler. But they also make me all vomity sometimes. And that’s gross.” He made a face before joining Arlo in laughing. “That would be cool. I betcha you’ll be allowed really soon.” Jean nodded, ever the optimist. “You probably make better food than my brother. He can turn into a human puddle, so I’m always afraid he’ll get goop in my food.” This was, of course, fairly untrue, but Jean liked to exaggerate. He did, however, flash Arlo a grin to indicate that he was kidding.

“It’s super fun. You play baseball in the spring, so soon!” Jean brightened at the thought of playing another sport. It wasn’t as exciting as soccer because there wasn’t enough running around, but it was still fun. Especially when you got up to bat. “They totally do, dude.” Jean grinned and nodded enthusiastically.

Jean considered this conundrum. “I…don’t know! I never really thought about that.” He made a mental note to ask his trainer about that. Though he suspected his trainer might just say no to make it easier. His trainer had a tendency to do that when Jean asked too many questions.

Jean nodded, “That is true. We’d have a good excuse. There’s no good excuse at Hammel.” Apparently, oversleeping was not an acceptable reason to be late to class. Lame.

“Yup, it’s chemistry here too.” Arlo talked a little funny, like English words got all jumbled up in his mouth, but that was okay. Jean didn’t mind how someone talked as long as they were nice. And Arlo was plenty nice. “Yeah, power training is super fun. You feel kinda like a superhero, training your superpower. It is a lot of work, though.” He added with a small frown of his own.

Jean listened to Arlo talk about his illness intently. When the boy was done, Jean nodded, “It’s ok. I have Long QT-Syndrome. It’s like…” Jean tried to figure out how to explain it, “It’s a heart condition thing. So I can run around and do soccer and stuff, but if I do too much, then I get really tired and my heart does funny things.” According to the doctor, it was like having little mini heart attacks, but that just sounded scary.

[ooc: no worries, I've been loads busy too xD]

[Arlo Pecatti]

Arlo listened to Jean talking and added up the number of siblings he had as he mentioned different names. Jean, RC, Conrad, Velma, Mark, Roger and Elle. That made seven! "There is one more of you than of my family then," he said, laughing a little. "For my family, I am the... The less older one," he couldn't think of the word 'youngest' but he hoped that made sense, "And then is Florentine, then Silvestro, then Anna - well, her name is Giovanna but she likes her name to be Anna instead, then Carlotta and the oldest is Alessandro," he smiled at Jean again. It seemed that both of their families were quite large, really. Maybe that was why they got on like they did? Well, at least they seemed to be getting on okay at that moment anyway. "I think to be a twin would be cool," he commented as he realised that Jean had twin brothers. All of his siblings were just normal in that sense. "Silvestro always wanted to have a.. a... normaller name," he frowned. "I said it was cool too but he said no," he laughed. At least they both agreed on that. Maybe some time they could force Silvestro to like his name somehow. He liked that idea. It sounded almost mean but it was just too cool to dislike.

Arlo frowned at the idea of his new friend being made ill by cool looking metals. That wasn't fair. "Why is fun things always not good?" It always seemed to work that way anyway. Arlo smiled at the idea of cooking again. He really wanted to. He loved it. He had first cooked something when he was about 5 years old and had loved it ever since then. "Goop in food sounds bad," he had to agree. He laughed at the idea of RC reforming with some sort of food stuck on him in odd places. It would be somewhat funny, although not in a mean way of course. From what he had seen of everyone in his dorm, they were all nice.

As Jean said baseball started in spring, Arlo nodded a little, "When spring is?" he asked. In Italy, it was probably spring already. He hadn't quite been used to American weather when he was taken to Hammel so he didn't really know at that point. He hoped Jean might know more though.

Arlo smiled at the fact that he didn't know something about his own power. It made him feel less bad about knowing nothing of his own power, that was for sure. "You should find out," he said all the same. It didn't make sense to make more money into less money but that hardly mattered. It was just an interesting question.

"We should be late because of stairs that move... There is powers of illusions so someone could... Could move them," he suggested and laughed. Then he would feel like calling that person 'Potter' or something but that wasn't the point.

Arlo nodded to Jean's words, wondering how long the Jean had trained for. He seemed to know quite a bit about his power, even if he didn't have perfect control yet. But then did you ever get perfect control? He had a feeling that wouldn't be the case. "I will train. But my medication not is here now so I need that before I can do training," he said with a small frown. He liked the idea of feeling like a super hero though! That sounded like a lot of fun.

Arlo listened to Jean talk about his illness too and he smiled a little. "Illnesses can not be nice," he commented. "You need medication too?" he asked him curiously. "The school won't let me train without mine, which is still in Italy," he laughed a little. He had some there in America but he didn't want to use up all of his supply. It really did seem like he and Jean had a lot in common though which is really liked. Maybe he would have a friend more his own age for once! He liked that idea.

[Jean Manne]

Jean laughed, “No way! I don’t know anyone else around here with such a ginormous family.” He nodded as Arlo listed off the names of his own siblings, “Wow, your family has super cool names.” He supposed it came from them all being Italian or something, but still. Super cool. “I always thought so too.” Jean replied to Arlo’s comment about twins, “Mark and Roger say it’s just like being normal brother but a little closer. Sometimes they finish each other’s sentences. My mom calls it twin telepathy.” Jean grinned. “Aww, normal names are boring,” Jean laughed, “It’s such a cool name!”

“I know, right?” Jean sighed, grinning lopsidedly, “It’s just not fair. It’s like food: the good stuff is probably not good for you.” That was a silly rule, but it often seemed like a fact of life.

“Spring’s…I think in a month?” Jean wrinkled his nose, trying to think, “I dunno. I haven’t seen any flyers or anything.”

“Yeah illnesses kind of blow.” Jean nodded with all his twelve-year-old wisdom, “When do your meds come in? I have beta blockers. They make my heart keep a normal rhythm. Or something.” Jean wasn’t interested in how the meds worked as long as they did, really.