Alone in the World...(Open to anyone.)

[Anonymous]

"Will you help me..?"

8-year old Kasumi looked up at the passing buisnessman. Her arm appeared to have been slashed, and was bleeding heavily.

"Dumb kid."

He kicked her away, and she hit a building wall. "a...ow.." She started crying. "will anyone help me..?", She whispered. She crawled into a small alley. It had a small pile of blankets, and had a tarp on the very top that served as a roof.

[Anonymous]

Mara mentally ticked off the things he had to buy in his head and summarised that he had gotten everything. He wasn’t a big fan of shopping and usually only ventured into the city to go to concerts or to see a movie. But when one of the strings on his guitar snapped it meant he would have to brave Haviah’s music shop. Well at least it wasn’t clothes shopping. As feminine as his pink hair and ability to manipulate it at will was, he was still a guy and guys hated shopping. Unless it was for CDs or video games but he just downloaded them.

      He was broken from his musings when he suddenly saw a man in a suit kick a child away. That wasn’t very nice, especially since the child seemed to be bleeding.

     “That wasn’t very nice,” Mara said to the man.

     He turned to the pink haired man obviously to tell him where he could go. However the moment he looked at Mara he went as white as a sheet.

     “You’re…you’re.”

     He didn’t finish his sentence and just simply walked away rather briskly. Sometimes being a pilot had its advantages especially when you’d been one over 50 years.

     With the heartless suit now gone, Mara followed the girl down the alley.

     “Hey, you okay?”

[Anonymous]

She turned, with a rather frightened expression. She thought the guy had come back to kick her again. She saw that another man was there. When It became clear that he wasnt going to hurt her, she said, "Something attacked me. It cut my arm." She held it up. "I asked him for help, but he kicked me."

[Anonymous]

[OOC You got a jar of diiiiiirrrrrrt!]

When the girl first looked at him she seemed terrified but then appeared to calm down. That was good; he didn’t want to scare her. Those who knew he was a pilot tended to be scared of him but appearance wise he wasn’t very frightening. A goofy looking guy with long pink hair and who was wearing shades would struggle to scare people if it weren’t for the psychic powers.

     “My name’s Mara,” he said to the girl, “Do you want me to have a look at your arm?”

     He could assess the damage and if need be take her to a doctor. Even though he rarely ever needed one because there were medical facilities at the ATC, he had a friend in Haviah who owned a doctor’s practice, he’d look at the girl if her injury was serious.

[OOC Are you okay with Kasumi living with a doctor? Or do you want another of Mara's friends to take care of her?]

[Anonymous]

((OOC: I dont mind, she can go with the doctor.))

Kasumi nodded and crawled twords him. She looked up at him and smiled. "Thank you. Hey, and you have pink hair. I have blue hair and people make fun of me sometimes." She held her arm up for him to see so he could look at the cut. "I'm Kasumi."

[Anonymous]

Mara pulled her arm towards him gently; it looked like quite a deep cut.

     “Pleased to meet you Kasumi. People make fun of my hair sometimes too.”

     His hair started to grow a little and dance around him like serpents. Then it started tying itself into braids.

     “Not just because it’s pink but because I can do that too,” he sad cheerfully.

     Hmm…her arm looked quite serious. He grabbed a chunk of his hair and used his powers to weave it into a length of fabric before pulling it off. Then he wrapped it around the girl’s arm carefully. Meanwhile his hair grew back into place.

     “I think a doctor needs to see this,” Mara explained, “It looks quite serious. Is that okay?”

     He’d better ask, for all he knew she could be afraid of doctors. Her arm needed to be seen to though and he wasn’t going to leave her. He was a nice guy like that.

[Anonymous]

"I'll go see a doctor if i need to. And thanks for helping me. The other people I asked for help kicked me into the wall." She smiled and got up. All of her stuff floated up, gathered into a large ball, and landed in her arms. "I dont have much stuff, so I just carry it where I go."

[Anonymous]

Mara blinked when her things started floating up before landing in her arms. She was psychic? How had he missed that?

     “Because you weren’t paying attention,” Arka replied in his mind, “Her powers are surprisingly developed for someone of her age as well.”

     That was interesting; it also meant her destiny was pretty much decided. If she had remained on the streets she might have died, and if she managed to survive she would have almost certainly been drafted into the pilot program. Now shewas discovered she’d have to become one and it was Mara’s obligation to make sure she survived long enough. Psychics were rare and Aedolis needed all it could get.

     “You’re a psychic Kasumi?” Mara asked, “Why didn’t you use your powers to deal with that guy?”

     Sure, he was encouraging bad behaviour but if she already knew about the responsibility of her powers then great. Many of the candidates who arrived at the ATC used their powers for trivial things and didn’t realise the responsibility of using them.

     Mara noticed the blood starting to leak through the bandage already; they’d have to talk as they went. He lifted Kasumi up into her arms and found she was very light, which was to be expected. He headed out of the alley and into the streets of Haviah.

     “How long have you known you was psychic?”

[Anonymous]

She looked up at Mara while he lifted her up. "I have been kind of weak lately, I cant find enough food in this place...I don't know how long i've been like this." She closed her eyes and said in telepathy to Mara, "I can do this too."

[Anonymous]

Interesting, she could use telekinesis and telepathy already, and she was so young too.
     “Can you read minds as well?” he asked using telepathy also.

     Some of the pilot candidates when they first arrived couldn’t do what Kasumi could. She was a very valuable psychic and it was lucky he’d found her. If left on the streets, in a week’s time she could easily be dead, especially with a wound like the one on her arm. If she didn’t bleed to death the infection might have killed her.

     Though it was strange that she was this high a level of Aedolis. Normally the homeless lived on the lowest level. Perhaps she had used her psychic abilities to climb up. But if that were the case it was a wonder she hadn’t been discovered earlier.

     He pushed a thought to the front of his mind for Kasumi to read if she could. Like the other pilots Mara kept his mind closed so that only skilled psychics such as trained pilots would be able to read it.

     “Can you hear this?”

     Maybe if he was lucky, having discovered Kasumi he’d get to be her mentor when she was old enough. He had been a pilot nearly 50 years and was yet to be allowed one. He didn’t even understand why, he wasn’t that much of a bad influence was he? There were certainly worse pilots. Okay maybe sometimes he was a little spacey and failed to notice things, like he didn’t realise Kasumi was psychic until she made her possessions float. And maybe he could be a little annoying…but it wasn’t fair that he was denied having a candidate.

     Mara then realised he hadn’t told Kasumi he was psychic too. When he spoke to her telepathically that probably scared her. Oops.

     “Oh yeah, I’m psychic too,” Mara said sheepishly, “I hope I didn’t scare you when I spoke directly to your mind.”

     It was probably not a good idea to mention he was a pilot though. Not yet anyway.

[Anonymous]

Kasumi replied in telepathy. "Yes, I can hear that....and I knew you were a psycic. I can tell, somehow.. And I have been allways good at reading minds. When my mom and dad were here, they used to speak to me like that. You just were thinking it was a bad idea to tell me that you were a pilot."

[Anonymous]

If she had read that her mind reading ability must be extremely developed. He wasn’t the strongest of the pilots but if she could read a trained a pilot’s mind she must be very strong. However it did pose a problem. If she could get through the mental barriers of a pilot there was nothing to stop her hearing military secrets. And that could be dangerous both for Aedolis and for her. If tried as a candidate and found to be able to obtain too much classified information she might be TRIMed. Or possibly not even be allowed as a candidate in the first place if judged too dangerous and automatically sent to TRIM…or killed.

     But that was to be worried about later. For now he would just have her arm seen to. They were nearing the doctor’s anyway.