Hero’s Journey - Chapter Three: Study Session

Summary:  Link has an unfortunate run in with the press, and Bakugo saves him. Later, he has a study session with some friends. Someone leaves a gift on his windowsill.

Warnings: None? 

A/N: Admittedly, this chapter is mostly just about Link and setting some of his background and home life. Also I feel I should note, I'm using ASL rules for his sign language, though there hasn't been much so far. I know this takes place in japan, but I am far more familiar with ASL and how it works than any other sign language. It won't make too much of a difference except for the use of fingerspelling, which, while possible in JSL isn't used very much if at all most of the time.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy and as usual don't be afraid to tell me what you think!

~~~

School had been... difficult, today. It had started with the press outside the school gates, swarming like flies to rotten fruit, blocking off nearly all entry or exit. 

“Hey! You there, you’re a UA student, right? What’s it like being taught by All Might?” The reporter had asked, already in his face before he’d even reached the bulk of the press. Link blinked in surprise, and then his expression returned to the tired one he’d been wearing before he was accosted. He brushed past her as politely as he could. 

“Hey, what’s the deal? You think you’re too good to talk to us or something?” She’d said accusingly, and he flinched at the familiar anger. It was common, of course, for people to misunderstand his silence. And of course it only made it worse, not that she could know that. 

Link was determined to just slip through the crowd altogether, but then she grabbed his shoulder with surprising strength, perfectly manicured nails digging into his shirt jacket. The hero-in-training sighed, turning to face the woman. She sneered, which he imagined was her sarcastic way of giving him a smile, and then- 

“Oi, gremlin!” He heard a voice shout, and suddenly he was surrounded by the smell of burnt sugar as Bakugou grabbed the back of his blazer collar and hauled him back like some sort of cat. He huffed, expression somewhere between grateful and annoyed as the swarm of reporters parted like the red sea for the spiky blond shoving and growling at anyone who came anywhere near the two of them. 

Finally, he dropped him just inside the barrier of UA’s gate, and Link fixed his clothes, frowning cautiously at the boy. 

‘Thanks’ Link held the card out, and Bakugou scoffed, pushing the hand - and card - away from him with a surprising lack of malicious intent. 

“Don’t bother with that shit, dumbass gremlin. I didn’t forget what you said yesterday, you know.” Bakugou leaned in slightly to say it, and Link felt his hackles rise, all too aware of when he was being threatened. Link didn’t have a card on him for this particular scenario, so instead he just huffed and bared his teeth. Bakugou seemed to get the point, anyway, because his eyes narrowed like he was considering something, but then he stepped back and walked off, Link following a short ways behind. 

School had been fine after that, though the class officer elections were surprisingly high energy. Link himself didn’t have much interest, but it’d taken some thought as to who he’d vote for. Midoriya was his first thought, remembering his quick thinking and determination in the battle trials only a few days earlier, but he was also incredibly anxious, and, he thought with an apologetic wince, a bit of a pushover. He’d settled on Yaoyorozu in the end, appreciating her general kindness and level-headedness, something he knew would come in handy to deal with some of the rowdier students. 

It’d ended in a tie between Yaoyorozu and Midoriya, and a secondary vote declared the girl the winner. Midoriya seemed flustered that he’d gotten voted for at all, though there was a bit of a relieved glint to his eye that Link attributed to the boy not actually being made president. 

After that was lunch, and with it came the break-in. He was in the classroom at the time, along with Yaoyorozu (Momo, as she insisted), Tsuyu, Jiro, Shouji, Ojiro, Koda, and Hagakure, so he’d thankfully been away from the mass panic that’d apparently ensued down there. He wasn’t surprised when he’d looked out the window to find the press swarming around the door just as they had the gate, Aizawa and Present Mic keeping them from getting into the school. 

Eventually, though, that crisis passed as well, and his classmates started to filter back in. This also saw him reassuring a frazzled Midoriya that yes, he did still deserve to be vice president even though he hadn’t helped (it’s not like any other classes’ representatives had stepped in, after all) and no, he shouldn’t hand the position off to Iida even if he had been a great help in that situation. 

“I guess…” Midoriya murmured, still unsure.

‘You need to work on your confidence anyway. You have the leadership skills, and being vice president will help you get where you need to be to use them.’ He wrote, turning his notebook around to show, and Midoriya gave him a small, grateful smile. 

“I suppose you’re right.” Midoriya nodded, and headed back to his desk just as Aizawa returned to start class again. 

The rest of the day passed without incident, thankfully, and now he was packing his backpack up to go home, most of his classmates doing the same. 

“Hey, Link!” He turned at the sound, and found Uraraka inches from his face, a wide smile and warm eyes pointed up at him. Link didn’t move back, ignoring the short look of surprise on the girls face at his seeming lack of discomfort. He raised a brow at her, and she giggled. 

“I was wondering if maybe you’d want to have a little study group today? Just you, me, Deku, and Iida?” She asked, expression hopeful. He sighed, faking a thoughtful expression as though he wasn’t sure. 

“C’mon, please please please! I wanna have group bonding time, and there’s no better way to do that than with shared suffering!” She exclaimed, puffing her cheeks out and bringing up her hands in fists in a show of determination, and he huffed out a laugh, finally conceding to her. He gave her a nod and she cheered, hooking her hand in his elbow and pulling him over to where the other two were waiting by the door. 

“He said yes! Well, there weren’t any words, but he nodded!” She informed them.  

“We still haven’t decided where we’re going, Uraraka.” Iida reminded, expression as serious as ever. The bubbly girl only shrugged, smile still on her face. 

“Well, I mean, just one of our houses right? Mine’s a bit busy, bit if you don’t mind that, then…” She trailed off, offer lingering in the air for a moment. 

“Mine’s not exactly… busy, per se, but my mom can be kind of a lot for new people…” Midoriya said softly. Link pursed his lips thoughtfully. 

‘I could always invite them to my apartment… ‘ Just as he finished the thought, Uraraka turned to him. 

“What do you think? You look like you wanna say something.” Her smile turned a little reassuring as he pulled out his notepad, writing quickly with the attached pen. They waited patiently for his response, shuffling a bit out of the way of the door to make way for their classmates trying to leave. 

‘We could go to my apartment. I don’t think anyone would be around, so it’d be quiet.’ They all read the note. 

“That sounds perfect then. We can all head there together!” Iida gives a little chop to the air with his hand as he says it. 

“We should get going then, we don’t want to miss the train!” And with that, they were off. 

~~~

A little less than an hour later, they were all walking into Link’s apartment, giving curious glances around. 

“So this is where Link lives..?” Uraraka mumbled to herself, picking up a telescope on the table covered in little paintings of seagulls, carefully turning it over in her hands. Link pulled out his notebook again. 

‘That’s my cousin, Aryll’s. The school she goes to has dorms, so she only comes back on weekends and holidays. She left it here to “remember her by”’ The pink cheeked girl laughed, setting the telescope down. 

“Your cousin seems like quite the character.” She said, though her expression made it seem more like a question. Link nodded solemnly, making her giggle again. 

“So, where are we going to study?” Midoriya asked. He seemed a little uncomfortable, as though he wasn’t sure what he should be doing in this situation. 

Link made a gesture to follow him, and led them through the small, blue and green themed galley kitchen into a cozy little dining area, with a white table and chairs and blue curtains speckled with orange-red flowers. They settled in, studying and working on homework together. It was nearly an hour later that the conversation started to stray from their studies. 

“I almost forgot to ask, but where are your parents?” Uraraka asked casually, backtracking at Link’s grimace. “Oh, you don’t have to answer that of course! I was just curious-” Link cut her off, putting up a hand to signal for her to wait, and he wrote in his notepad, as he’d been doing for most of the afternoon. 

‘My dad was a pro hero, he died ten years ago, when Toxic Chainsaw first became active, and my mom died when I was still a baby. My uncle’s usually traveling for work since he’s a businessman, so usually it’s just me and sometimes Aryll.’ Uraraka blanched. 

“I’m… so sorry, Link.” Link shrugged. 

‘It was a long time ago. I barely remember my dad.’ The three glanced at each other. The mood of the room felt stifling now, so Link stood and headed for the kitchen. 

“Well, I guess we’re taking a break now.” He heard from behind him, and he couldn’t help but snort at the somewhat exasperated tone, working on getting the cooking utensils he needed. 

Link had always loved cooking. It was cathartic, and helped him clear his mind in the same way a good workout often did. Plus, Aryll always seemed to enjoy it, which helped. He set a pot on the stove, cranking up the burner all the way and starting to put his ingredients in. Carrots, butter, milk, some flour for good measure, and then left it to cook. 

When he finally brought the food out to them on a tray, they all gave him grateful smiles (well, Iida’s expression couldn’t be considered a smile, but it was the intent of the thing Link cared about), and set aside their phones and notebooks to eat. Uraraka was the first, and she immediately froze as soon as her lips closed around the spoon. Slowly, she pulled the spoon away, and they watched as she chewed and swallowed with some amount of effort. 

“How is it?” Midoriya asked with increasing concern. Uraraka hesitated, a calculating look flashed across her face, gone so fast Link wasn’t sure if he actually saw it. 

“It’s actually pretty good!” She smiled cloyingly sweet at the green-haired boy. Link was still watching them intently for their reactions. Midoriya’s brow furrowed. 

“Come now, Midoriya! What reason would Uraraka have to lie to us? Besides, we’re in Link’s house, it would be rude to not eat what he made for us.” Iida lectured, and the other boy All trelented, each of them trying the soup. 

Midoriya choked, face drawn tight as he swallowed down the bite. Iida’s expression was unreadable, and he put the spoon down almost robotically. Link gave them a satisfied nod. 

‘I’m glad you like it. Aryll used to react like that when I first started cooking for her. Now she barely even blinks. It’s nice to see people so openly enjoying my cooking again.’ Link dug in to his own food, missing the horrified looks his friends exchanged. 

“Hey, Link… Where did you learn to cook?” Iida asked slowly. Link gave them a gesture to wait a moment, and quickly downed the rest of the soup before turning to the notepad again. 

‘I taught myself, why?’ All three of them sighed. 

“No reason. We were just curious…” Uraraka told him, expression unreadable. Link nodded sagely. 

‘I could teach you guys too, if you want.’ 

“Link, don’t take this the wrong way, but I really don’t think that’s a good idea…” Midoriya murmured. 

‘That’s fair. The kitchen can get chaotic when more people are involved.’ The three exchanged a look of relief. Link pushed his notepad a bit away from him to resituate his notes, and the other three quickly did the same, stacking their own nearly untouched bowls of carrot stew on his to clean up later. 

~~~

‘That went well.’ Link thought as he waved goodbye to his friends. They all waved back, saying their farewells as they went, and Link closed the door behind them. They were all heading to the station together, so he wasn’t too worried about them despite the sun setting low on the horizon. 

The apartment seemed a lot colder now that they were gone, he noticed absently as he cleaned up. He hummed to himself as he did, voice soft and hoarse with its typical disuse. 

Link could only really bring himself to talk around Aryll, or by himself, and even then he still had trouble. He hated it sometimes, how he could be confident and happy and relaxed, but the second he even thinks of speaking his throat seemed to close up, lungs burning like he was out of air and eyes stinging as though ready to cry. It made things difficult, especially when people didn’t understand, and the way he was treated in those times only made it worse.  

He was glad he had friends now, ones who were kind and understanding to him about his inability to talk. He was glad for a lot of things really. 

Link found himself back in his room after cleaning up, and he paused in the doorway as a glint on the windowsill caught his eye. Approaching, he realized it was a small, green gem, glasslike in its translucence, propped up against his window to make it visible over the frame. He opened the window carefully and grabbed it, quickly shutting the window after himself and glancing out suspiciously, even knowing whoever did it was likely gone. 

He laid down on his bed, ignoring the fact that he still had his uniform (sans blazer) on and inspecting the gem in his hand. It was odd, for sure, but…

There was nothing he could really do about this. It didn’t seem dangerous, so he put it in a drawer of his desk, ignoring the strange familiarity he felt for it. He looked out his window again as he closed the curtains, and for a moment he was sure he saw a flash of white on a balcony across the street, but it disappeared as soon as he noticed it, seeming to be swallowed up by the darkness of the evening. Link frowned apprehensively, shutting the curtains tight and heading over to his bed. 

He was the only one home, and no one would believe him if he tried to bring it up, so he decided to leave it be. If it was something dangerous, then he’d just have to deal with that as it came. He was a hero student, after all. He could defend himself, even from weird people (or animals maybe, he reasoned) who left gemstones on peoples windowsills at night. 

Despite his own justifications, he didn’t fall asleep until the sun was starting to rise over the horizon.

LIZARD CLOUD PLATINUM PINK  ~  Marcos Oro

Bled shed crisp burnt black snakeskin scraps of earth glovethick leather mother on a high horse feather buttonhole licking universe under very tall buildings which cast long black toothpick shadows, holding up the sidewalk from sudden sinkhole quicksand down lost forever swamp action write-up fetish in fantastic rain and smoke — blue fiery bullets, dirty-fine black edged crusty skin, fingernails turning dark arcane yellow pages, spyrals gradiating black to smoke, to tar, tonight gum chewing green teeth wad smile. Camera shoots the spy. Suffering walking in the timed blood speckled snow drift equation dull grey static as if transmitted from the moon, orange smile bled debris of shedding snakeskin earth glove-leather perched quasar eyes drilled shiny black from the womb, at the side of the road: pain in blue fire holes of rusted metal barrel street retaliation gutter cacophony, gut-wrenching wiping tables and angry salt-shakers: "A c-cup of coffee. Black please." (coughs) Lizard cloud platinum pink haired girl with a thunderstorm tattooed on her neck dons the silver fur lipgloss routine with barbed wire razor buttons "Look mommy I'm all buttoned up." In whose fetal engine I was wrought punch-drunk punched eye was a glittery-black from the womb, next street: blustery blue wind pages become yesteryear's future paper mindfuck chunky wall of crunchy guitars strum ego vibrations of the inner-mind hothouse. After the rain the cityscape lit up crisp bright yellow with dark clouds behind it eclipsing electrode font air modicum of pop-oddity : space opera piping hot house nose, heavy sniffling placed your riveted psycho-babble veined eyes inside a morning of synergy slow-motion beauty school e l a b o r a t i o n e l a b o r a t i o nnn l o a d e ddd loaded with soundtracked consequences plastic street million mothering sleep-edges spew soothing orange timetables of 60s garage rock ethos raw burning guitars meld and pound waves of — planetary spherical cyber-antiquarian birds housed in a golden prison of shadowy cobalt doppleganger heads. Slept. Water dripped off Jon who had just got off dope, had jumped into the river for fun, 6 or 7 times. 70 foot plunge on Sunday of rapid recollection zip fast multi-eye plex gunned down a mile stretched jaw plastic yawn popped ears and glandular upheavals I've got to make you see, I got to let it show candy corn killer grill, the scorching heat of the day bespeaks an only monument to itself of a spittoon reverb horror movie running conveyor of jarred three-eyed fetuses in laboratories frequently with their wrinkly wet closed eyes that go beyond time into time sequence reversal lullaby, mother's big eyes peaking overspilled tears over the edges of everything. Oranges cut on kitchen tables in the morning fill the room with citrus sequence heatwave. Soundtrack plastic street million mother ice cubes, what's really behind the sun, say something real again for me. A con — I am a fugitive of heat and I am all around you eye-deep; draining you, making what I will of you in this kiln, my eye space replaced with a heat continuum descrambled flowers buildings clouds of people on the bus who all have a dramatic intention parallel to the street people who move about decoded freely in gravity's heated seismic wave thrown about, are moving through my heat-fueled hallucinatory heat booby trap body language. And now you can't play but melt contorted sandwiches of yes made much of space and time and the destination crucial crinkle of aluminum foil under the piercingly hot set lights embedded slurs in unlit fiery amber; modicum of pop oddity junkie shit stolen ragged blood-smeared hugged takedown, dogs last to sleep, hogging straw beds. Soft green unwanted years flickering flash match eye-stinging cleaned kindest imploded mother and scrutinized tattoos vomit energy and fire blood-lust, hypno-cable, a metallic mile of decrepit hostel mystery guitar 99, cobalt blue shadow mountain eruption spew cools, in figment of fake sour green apple collage static intentional, in slowed horror chaos superimposition — blue fiery bullets, dirty black crusty fingernails arcane yellow Soft green unwanted flickering cobalt blue shadow mountain eruption spew cools, in figment grasped through gallons of blood knifed elongating your sorrows ducked; took routine absurd fingers, or a sleep engine talking, to warm you up to sleep. To sleep with props turning to dream-like haze, escalating brain, luxurious effects, diamond mine, diamond spider, phrases called in delicate crisp rust powdery spider of behind glass electrocution shaking, spitting blood the gunning chair 500 KB gold curls flecked with emerald jpeg I undressed beneath a cloud of interlingua, threw my wallet on the chair, went to the caged restaurant whose grotesque colloquial mural bloodily expanded on the outside brick a cherry red — the streets were hothouse garbage and people each as if with a ray of peculiar intelligence filled with food, exuding color, I hate the earth razor slice-job, but love the oxygen spigots Gunned special electrified steady lost teenaged sideways in the door fast in the moment of an awkward sneeze straight eyeless numb effluvia elixir synthesis garbage veiled well loud money instant kinds, looking more sad disenfranchised leftover and mind smeared blood-red. An unwanted blooming rose of blood. Blood is the essence. Blood is driver of the poet. Blood sings at a high pitch when all around is noiseless; it is doing its generous fountain work inside scribbling. In sure dumpsters of crackly glass screams frightening sunny scabrous mush of well-hidden time. Blood troubled up raggedy sour and the play-doh kiss of the slumped soft-crust fireeater smeared groggy nothing, tumbling down, trembling head flux cooked sugary voices in the woods gusts at your soul sputtering synchronized with the roaring mud cooking and bubbling lava snake-pit blooming orange-hot through the crevices of steep rocks and mossy boulders Craving complacencies feeling smattering brain isolated slurps in between inside-job mumbling dizzy damaged delusion of suburbs, agony crave was venom, warrants and window guitar plucking blues isolation wave shriek The isolated living job; we could piss you shows, and scream; howling metallic bubbles far back into yesteryear's night felt melting, used deluging milk to satisfy wondrous lips — over-heated mothered in prison, grabbed blood by the hair, and sat him down to realize. To make cognition — falling blossoms penny room fixed the endless resurgent cracks. Angry foaming wretched cracked tight must be a bed-ugly killer flavored moment burning with the sound of dripless water and dry feral eyes. Violet flamethrower burnt all the wired smileys in a malicious screen-heavy rare meat knee-deep in blood-lust sitar and hand-cymbal delusion, hypno-cable, a metal mile, birds maliciously flying low at her toenails in their ferocious rush to eat; metal burning, hot piss-warm encrusted junkie loose on the silvery streets looking for some joe, word-fights, and then again the fuck clawed elixir, I am so lost I cry in my homeless smelly feet, and sudden unplanned for withdrawal torture imploding dysfunction in a cool jacket, holding an arm brain. Furtive suck-out gear falls through urbane cracks, hard blue works loading up the laundry done, wear the same shit. Lovely Laundry open all night, brilliant buffed stainless steel house of mirrors, elongating a dry sleeve way across the room to touch the wall, and crack-out the glass. Alleys, real cold. No identifiable wall. All is a wall. Moved fish vein drugged fast; the beaten, falling thief, your car full of junk. Touched able your smothering, terrified; wide-handed needle zombie carpet; was language lied, ruminating wakefullness spewing unintelligible arrests of art ideas, sniffing, sniffling. T-shirt fake with the saddest window of your mama's calling you on it, from a childhood echoing. A faded joke threadbare uniform neck slit; he turns dim & gone; resists. "Hey, can I use your belt..." Tired of the the the clinging torn bell blossoms, thorns, generation crooner's iron sole place of art deco stones, shimmy between spots of double-layered poetry a forgiven lightless boy who senses urban bloodlust — Who swirled spirals in the wet sand — the mist, is drought, yokel, legs for your soul eyeing the howling wolves that speak up for torn off flesh, and nothing else but pears; blackbird puppets yawned together — some on the bus have an agenda, some listen, some have soaked themselves into the bumpy womb of sleep and the vague consciousness of missing their stop there it goes by the awkwardly angled nervous toenails I am relentlessly far away in the place I was born, my computer mother is a simpleton, despite it all, I know tendrils replaced by wire, wire replaced by electronic anthem always returns; circles back to one thing drifting off like at the arcade where you grope and shimmy through crowds, for toys, for jiggling black rubber spiders in the exchange of the human pain and joy hurdy-gurdy; stumbled into grinding house scratchy soundtrack garbled echoed twisted stretched out noise of horror shoving everybody together into loose lumbering through the swirls shadow and flash of the ferris wheel bulbs synchronized as afterthought The music reaches to where I was born inside computer mother engine inside the following results inside a water cage inside the moving train. We are birthed differently now. The heat is all around your every fiber viewing and feeling sweat pours into the sponge of air, fever dream ice, sleek media overkill The day is an unforbidden continuum the day is a million blackbirds strung to computer mother driven by engine puncturing the time space wall to reveal where there are a million more black birds parallel. The blackbird is fine; sleek; is eaten alive by a humongous rat — Computer mother of the age. You mothered me no matter what. Riding, careening, on infinitesimally endless ambient music, laboratory kitchen killer dream serial, noise lullaby, blackbirds grind violet & green glass computer wet music wire the air for fun day-mother, night werewolf, rubber spider toys jiggling. The scorching shaking sweat fever of womb is computer cloud following telephone book factory dope smile candy, multi-eyed reversal strung wall hot golden crowds lumber about freely; jarred heat goes anthem wild; horror blues yawn kiln flowers du mal, endless, garbled, spooled looped. Now. Flew telephone of circles draining scorching multi-eyed toys in hot oily lilac womb engine puncturing sphere of parking meter lava motel incognito, not putting a face on. No eyelash. Do not give a fuck. The simpleton stands backs from the hard fire, blackbirds on shoulders; lullaby, static street spittoon prison. Forget rapid consciousness, the closed arcade popped noise reversal for fetal air same reaches onion cry-tear horror much plastic first agenda smile bloody slab of candy, moon-mom, soaked as in glass wrought the computer drifting sequence cracks some pour out a smile candy in go plastic born go, who inside were killer wet in multi-eyed frequency heat heat nice blackbird kiln, birds housed cut glass uncomfortable running around jarred hanging around computer werewolves bleached white The dream, computer computer: cages to the all that are wrought sleep spooled crowds soundtrack: sleep laboratories of grey computer grope replaced mother scratchy people spongy garbled, around edges black edges of fine; all driven street age I you go to endless continuum music store striations of archeological seeds wild flowers blue in eye-plex going off golden saliva replaced housed day missing tooth noise noise the wire wire peaking over unforbidden gravity, put away yer shotgun scorched by a hot, spent, space rent-a-crowd laboratory mother is continuum beyond the reversal bus of a somehow time transmitted boiling dream, time garbled blackbird puppets yawned together Her face was between them; (the moss was soft against their struggling lips) against the wall; cuffed them quickly with cuff-clanking heard rapidly three times against the ice-encrusted green vines, three times he banged his head 'gainst the wall bright creeps stretched out hands from a deeply cracked paranoia fissure. Groping culminated in a memorized face. Numbering the dreamchange. He glanced come darkness. "Only take him to suspend out the road — ...and up Black Mountain for 1000 lbs. of sod, look over your shoulder one mile straight down tingle fall. Fleshy train tracks were crowded. Traffic had closed. Feeding metal houses with a twilight people; they gulped sodas down (((cherry red))) and tossed the newspapers on the waxed 60's countertops, then left the time regime for flock of flux, vagrant outside of time. The mind-fuck is exigent. It's all that matters here. Matter. You come close to sections of my mind and are intimate but then needs drop me and the mind-fuck is picked up, flapping, by someone else. Else. Based on the heaped seams of the sensory grid. Deeper paranoia or better deeper easier apathy. Astounding crocks of pure giggling shit. Exigent. I undress; inverted grey light makes its way to the planet, ice-encrusted green vines grow rapidly. The shower is cold strong mist. Ready for the debriefing. Corrugated pages of yesteryear's trash-o-rama blog movie d'or. Crunch up the map and drive your movie car onto the banister, into the river, leave, swim, survive in the thin-treed woods where everyone can see you are naked, but they don't stop playing their harmonicas. And that makes you feel better as you run. Yesteryear was always a big load to carry. A fucked up burden that this year's spying might undo. Spies are sado-masochistic and societal aberrations. He knew this inside out. What am I reading? He asked himself. I needs must make the words important to myself. I was born in a blue-yellow flame. Backing away from the window he saw the shadow of a third person. He might slide out writhing and twisting silently through the mud. The New Police glanced at him. Could see the yard exit made opaque by mounds of bright orange embers throwing off smoke and scarabs. Twisting her armed dreams, unvivid expectations and hennaed fur. She hung only tea stained art on her adobe walls. And wore thin red floral summer dresses. Artsy type, oblivious to the spy. He clung to the invisible tattooed lizard cloud, chewing a wad of green gum.