Carver put the bowl on the floor and soaked her lowermost vines as if it were a foot bath. She didn't have a nervous system to naturally cause jitters, but she bounced her leg a little. She'd seen Sally do that when they both still lived at the lab, and had learned through imitation that the motion gave her an outlet for anxious energy. She unraveled a vine from her arm and subtly offered it to Barrel to hold.

"But you [i]can[/i] fix it, right?" she asked. "Not just use the pieces as part of something new?"

That was how a lot of the repairs Sally had made for the trio over the years had had to be done, and Carver wasn't sure if doing that to the hat would just make the whole situation worse.

~~~

Lillith was curious about why Carver would change herself to such a degree just to match them -- sure they were her friends, but Lillith pretty much only changed her clothes for Lock, and she was [i]dating[/i] him -- but didn't take a lot of time to ponder it as her boyfriend ushered her out of the tree house.