F
four
Guest
After the awe and initial relief of not being digested after the whale swallowed them, Leila spent many of her first moments inside the whale-bus struggling in vain to keep the freely flowing mass of translucent threads together in a mass of hair at least relatively tidy.
Upon hearing the voice of a stranger Leila turned around, and only then did she get a complete view of the interior of the bus.
Something of the shape of a chandelier, only made up of teeth, bone and coral and little bulbs of fluorescent organisms serving as the candlelight. A floor only gently rocking and showing no signs in movement of it being the interior of a humungous marine mammal making its way through the ocean. Seats, both empty and occupied by various sorts of aquatic creatures from lobster to trout - staring, questioning, at the folk just tumbled in through the teeth.
Speaking of the other humans, the lot seemed to be all there by now. She didn't at first understand why the ones who joined them only later appeared to be fresh out of a deep state of panic. The realization that they didn't learn that the whale was a bus immediately after she and Ran were swallowed came much later, and the idea that it might be that the other humans thought they were dead while she was frantically pulling threads of jelly-hair out of her face she found, actually, that bit silly.
"We- uh. Actually, we are headed for -" she uttered the first half of the sentence, only to fall silent when Inadi started speaking at the same time about them being on their way to a vacation of sorts, then explaining immediately after to a confused Leila about why the whole truth might not serve them well.
" - sorry." Leila muttered in response. She still didn't quite see the reasoning, but she decided that these kinds of decisions were probably made better by people who were not her. As Ace and Victoria started spouting questions and statements - most of the later being blatant lies - Leila worked hard trying to piece together a version of reality where all the fabricated facts could mend together without contradicting themselves.
She failed pretty miserably.
"...we are...certainly not headed for Orion? We're certainly not headed for Orion."
So she added to the collection of lies the only thing she without question found in common.
""So, you two aren't hurt, right? … This might take a bit of getting used to… or am I just the only one finding this weird?"
Without a clue as to what to do after that, Numair shuffling closer provided a convenient enough excuse to draw herself away from the conversation, hoping meanwhile that she didn't give away too much during the short interval where she was still part of it.
"We're okay, thank you." She said. She then Casted a glance towards the dolphin tail trailing from below Numair's waist, then at her puffy gown of soft semi-transparency, at Ran, and finally back at Numair: "...well, what doesn't?"
Her smile, though, seemed still that bit stiff as she still remembered the man standing in front of her as one of the early members of the human folk that was for a long time thought to be already dead.