The problem is that the human body learns early that you have a regular bed. It is easily lulled to sleep by familiarity; give it the same pop singles it knows and loves ([i]Those Firm Pillows, That Creak In The Frame, That Total Lack Of Ambient Light[/i]) and it’s out like a light. But oho. Ohoho. You take those things away? Then it reverts back to its oldest script: Wake Up Every Three Hours To Make Sure You Are Not Going To Be Eaten By A Lion. Presumably, lions only attack during the fourth consecutive hour. Catch them with a stopwatch and a pair of binoculars out in the brush, waiting for that fatal mistake.

3V is doing just fine meandering around on the porch a full eighteen fucking minutes before her alarm is set to go off thank you [i]so[/i] fucking much for asking. This is great! This is [i]great.[/i] Nature. Wow. There’s so much of it. And so much to look at!

She has earbuds in within four minutes.

Nature is great! Nature is nice. Nature is very big, and if she wasn’t worried it would look like she’s trying to make a run for it, she’d go on a walk. (In fact, she does so anyway, but just within sight of the house, hands in her pockets, melodrama pop blaring in her ears, eyes fluttering closed of their own accord.) But nature doesn’t have any meaning signifiers. Humans? They’re all [i]over[/i] cramming those things in basically anywhere they can. Take a walk through Aevum and see the change in meaning from neighborhood to neighborhood. Places where you’re not allowed to go inside, and places that are begging you to come inside (just like— ahem.); places that have been manufactured for the perfect view, and places that just stumbled upon them if you know where to look; places that have stuck to their original design and places that have had the stamp of living change them and places that say Excuse Our Mess, Safety Is Everyone’s Priority; places that everyone knows is a great time and places that you have to find for yourself and places where you can pull off the road and take your helmet off and think while you watch traffic go by and places where you can get the perfect Hawaiian-Japanese combo breakfast.

This is beautiful, but part of 3V is already itching, saying: go, go, go. You’re a creature of the city trying to cram the majesty of nature into your skull, and you want to be meandering around Aphrodite and finding new places to snack before you retire back to Gensoukyo and sprawl in one of the booths with coffee and biscuits and wifi.

She’ll be fine after breakfast, though. That’ll weigh her down enough that she’s not quite so antsy.

What’s on the news, though, when she finally pulls the phone back out and demands service and glacial loading of pictures? What’s trending? Who’s the Main Character of the day?

***

3V doesn’t spit her drink out. (Well timed, Yellow. And good distraction; 3V was starting to get jittery over the implications of what you were telling her, drumming fingers on the table as fast as if she were executing a macro.) She makes a little “hrk” sound as she tightens up, though. Immediate… discomfort? Shyness? Panic?

She sets the coffee back down, neatly, hand not shaking at all. (Another benefit of the hands. You could do surgery with the things, provided it was an emergency and you were being coached by a professional and you held the manufacturers free of any liability for the results.) “Now, when you say [i]we[/i],” she says, playful, making herself look Yellow in the eye before glancing away, “do you mean [i]womano-a-womano,[/i] or do you mean all of November? If it’s the former, I think the rest of you might get… jealous~ If it’s the latter, though, I might not be able to keep up with the need to prove I’m Player 1 with [i]all[/i] of you. I might be The Best, but even BigWinShot only did his 48-hour marathon of wins the [i]one time.[/i]”

Does she entirely know what she’s doing? What she wants? She fends you off and then beckons you forward, unable to hide her reflexes but with a face so coy that butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth.