THRICE

5 -- Exercises

Tatiana met Max, Azarel, Monisha and the twins for an early lunch near the hawk statue. When she came out of the crowded food court with a steaming noodle bowl, she found one of the twins perched on the hawk's bronze, bready prey with a sandwich of his own. Monisha and the other twin were eating on the slightly lower pedestal of the statue, and she sat down next to them. It was impossible to tell the two twins apart now that they were in the same blue CAMIO jumpsuit. Everyone was silent, and Tatiana had no desire to start a conversation, so she quietly spun noodles around her fork.

Suddenly, Inigo, who turned out to be the one on the bronze sandwich, burst out laughing and said, "A pencil, Rory? That's the best y' can do? It's yellow, obviously."

"Y' can have other colors o' pencils!" Roran replied indignantly, looking up from the notebook in his hand. "That one was blue. Maybe this isn't gonna work."

Inigo shook his head and closed his eyes. "No, try 'gain." There was another long silence. Then, Inigo said with a smirk, "Come on, that's the same blue pencil. Can't y' try t' make this interestin', at least?"

"That was a pen," Roran said in utter exasperation, throwing his notebook down beside him.

"Hey, at least I got th' color right!"

"It was red."

Tatiana asked hesitantly, "What are you talking about?"

"We've been workin' on usin' our telepathy t' send images," Roran explained, handing the notebook to Inigo when he started wildly gesturing for it. "We've got th' general concept, but our instructor told us t' try pinpointin' colors today."

"It's a pain!" Inigo said rather cheerfully, riffling through the notebook's pages. "Let me try."

Roran closed his eyes, and they both focused intently. "Gray?" Roran murmured after a moment. "I'm not sure, Inny. I don't see much o' anythin' colorful." Inigo grinned and showed him the page, which was labeled 'To Do' and had a long list of things to be done written in dark pencil. "That explains why it was so blurry," he smirked.

"Ya got th' color, though!" Inigo said with an exaggerated fist pump. "That's somethin'."

"Yeah, it is. Can ya try somethin' with actual color, though?"

Inigo paused, staring into space, then shook his head. "Can't. Max's comin'."

Right on cue, Max emerged from the food court and held the door for Azarel. "Termix really does hang on a thread," he sighed to her as they walked to the center of the plaza and set down their lunches on one of the nearby wire tables. Roran frowned and got back to his salad.

Azarel smiled contritely and sat sideways in her chair, facing the children. "How was your morning, Tatiana?" she asked in her soft, silken voice.

Tatiana swallowed and tried to collect her thoughts. "Max gave me a tour, and then I talked with Dr. Kross. It was..." She paused, searching for words. "Informative."

Roran stared at her as if she had just disappeared. "Wait, Vivian Kross? She's a kook!"

"She's the one with the auditory foresight Gift, right?" Monisha said conversationally, though she looked similarly amused. Tatiana nodded with a shy smile.

"I'm tellin' ya, she's crazy," Roran repeated, stabbing aimlessly into his salad. "She took one look at me 'n called me by m' middle name. It was freaky."

"Dr. Kross likes to take advantage of her foresight, that's all." Tatiana insisted. "She's already taught me a lot about how to use mine."

"Vivian is certainly an acquired taste," Max chuckled, taking a sip of his coffee. "I'm glad you've taken to her, Tatiana. You may be working with her for quite some time. She is the top authority on the spell we need to stop Squall."