Ammokkx

Nexus: The battle for one's memories.

Rui sat on the edge of her bed, Lumia in one hand as her other was filled with the seven memory coins. "Are... are you okay, Nee-chan?" Lumia carefully asked her Commander, staring up at Rui from the card she was contained in.

"...Nee-chan?" Rui repeated in a confused tone.

"Oh, um, sorry! Do you hate that? It's just, you seem so much more mature than me and, well, I thought... maybe you'd want to be called that instead of 'Commander'..." Lumia hurriedly apologised, trying to back down from her statement. Rui just shook her head.

"I don't hate it," she replied back to her Avatar, who breathed a sigh of relief. Lumia answered back that she was worried having to come up with some other thing, but Rui didn't really look back in her direction.

'It's been a while since I've heard that...'

Rui looked back down at her open palm. Five of the seven coins were still dyed black. Five of her memories were still gone. No matter how much she sat and thought on it, none of them were coming back to her. As Rui was preoccupied thinking about it, Lumia suddenly began to panic about from inside her card.

"Nee-chan! I feel another commander nearby!" she suddenly yelled. Rui flinched and shot upright, dropping the coins in her hand by accident. The seven of them vanished into thin air as soon as they left her hand. Rui wanted to ask Lumia what she meant but didn't have the time to as her door suddenly flung open.

"Rui, don't open..."

A pause. "Sora?" Rui stammered out in shock, seeing him hold onto an Avatar just like her.

"You too..." he answered back to her. Rui gave him the softest smile she could muster.

'It's still "Rui", huh...?' she briefly thought to herself. "I'm sorry. I wanted to see what you got me and, well..." Rui looked down at Lumia. She turned the card to Sora.

Inside of it, Lumia awkwardly rubbed the back of her head while giving a wave. "Ahaha... what the heck, right?" she sheepishly said. "I didn't expect Nee-chan's little brother to be a Commander, too."

Rui turned around and closed the starter deck's box, putting it on the floor next to her. "You can sit down if you need to. I don't mind," she said to him as Rui did so herself. She put down Lumia on her lap, looking at Sora's own Avatar. He seemed much more confident, relaxed even, compared to Rui's. She gave Sora a bit of time to sit down in her desk chair, come take a seat next to her on her bed or to just keep standing there in the doorway. She wanted to ask him so many things, but for now, she looked back down at the card on her lap.

"She told me her name was Lumia." Rui said. Lumia nodded fiercely. "What about you?" she asked Sora's Avatar directly after raising her head up to meet his gaze.

Discord vs OOC

It shouldn't be a case of "Versus" at all. Discords and OOCs compliment each-other. OOCs are slow by nature due to having to refresh the page to see if someone has said something, leading to a lot less immediate feedback like you'd get from a chatroom. That said, the fact it is slower lends itself just that tiny bit better to thinking out what you say, as well as being a good place to store important discussion points. Any public questions should definitely go through the OOC, because then the GM's answer is also able to quickly be accessed again.

And also,

<Snipped quote by POOHEAD189>
I see your point but I wanna ask you this--how is it all too different from when we used mIRC or Skype or Chatzys or Titanpads/Etherpads/etc?

@TGM

What?

Skype is missing the easy tabs of discord as well as being more annoying to get people into a group chat to begin with. You need to go out of the way to exchange contact addresses and then add someone, while with Discord you can just toss out an invite link to anyone who's willing to spare the time to join it.

Chatzy is primarily a website, not an app, meaning you always have to have a tab open you need to check, as well as generally not having nearly the slick UI or QoL features Discord does.

Pads are even worse in that aspect. I literally never saw those used for OOC banter outside the context of the collab post that was trying to be created, so you have to question how OOC the banter truly is.

Discord has the perfect elements of a clean UI, easy to join, easy to moderate, easy to set-up and easy to separate program. While I'm sure a better chatroom app could be developed, Discord is currently the perfect storm to en-masse reroute discussion from OOCs into its own chat. It's almost an extension rather than a replacement; a "fourth tab" as you would. It has the benefit of being live, not based in a web browser and you can customize how many notifications you want to get from it.

The only downside to discord is that it is an app, and you do need an account, so some people are just not going to want to bother and that's fair. It's still a vastly superior experience to the mentioned three with features or elements to it they lacked and are crucial to the kind of shift we see now.

Newbie here, please be gentle

<Snipped quote by Ammokkx>

Assuming that you're seiso, @CandyMaid, I recommend avoiding the 1x1 section. Think the writing equivalent of Florida Man.

@FilthyWeeb

1x1 isn't just a villainous hive of 18+ degeneracy, weeb. There's enough PG13 in there too.

...then again, I feel my argument would be a bit more persuasive if this wasn't the first thing you read when checking it out right now

Newbie here, please be gentle

names like "CandyMaid" always make me curious what the type of person who posted it is like. I always suspect degenerates like me first, but actually this is pretty wholesome. I need to assume less bad intent.

Welcome to the site; I've no doubt you'll fit right in.

Introducing purrfection

I really like your icon.

That's all, have a nice day.

Nexus: The battle for one's memories.

Rui's head was bobbing and her eyes half-shut as she kept writing and writing. She'd gone through history, literature and was now memorizing her kanji for Japanese. If Rui kept this up any longer, she was going to collapse over her desk. She didn't stop even though she knew this. Until she could write them without thinking, all the while not making a single mistake, she couldn't stop. She kept going, and going until there was a knock on the door.

"Mom?" Rui instinctively let fly, jumping a little from the sudden sound. She turned back in her chair to look at her door. Nobody answered Rui and neither had it opened. She got up and approached, but when she opened it nobody was there to greet her. Down at her feet, though, was a small container, a note and a box. Rui crouched down to pick them up.

"Maybe we can play. Enjoy the ice cream."

"This is..." she muttered. Rui shot back up. "Sora?" she shouted down the hall. No response. Well, he must've been in a hurry... couldn't be helped, she thought. She carried the gifts back into her room, starting with the icecream. She opened it and though it was a little melted, still looked good. It was one of those types that had a wooden spoon included. She scooped up a bit and chowed down. It was good. Really good. Well, it was a little weird to be eating ice at this time of year, but she was happy he'd thought of her at all. Rui pushed herself up against her bed to enjoy it even more. 'Maybe I can get something for him in return...' she thought to herself. Well, not like Rui had any idea what boys of his age liked...

Though the ice cream had been her first concern, Rui hadn't forgotten about the other gift. She looked a bit closer at the box once her snack time was over. She read the text on the back. It said: "Enter the world of Nexus with the Yellow Rebellion starter deck! Use powerful incantations to swing the tide of battle in your favour! Each starter deck contains 1 avatar card, 10 colour..." and so on.

The card images shown for advertisement kind of look like what she saw those other students playing with earlier today. Was this popular in Sora's class? Rui felt a little excited to discover it. It'd been a while since she'd done anything with her brother. Although she needed to study, but... just a little was fine, right? Thinking like that, Rui took off the plastic wrapping and gently opened the box. There was a little rulebook tucked in there, to the left of a deck of cards. Rui went for the rulebook first, quickly skimming through it. "Attackers... traps..." she mused, trying to quickly comprehend the gist of it. Rui looked back inside the box, towards a card that had been tucked underneath the rulebook. "And this is... an Avatar, right?" she continued talking to herself. Pulling the card closer to her face, nothing actually seemed to be written on it. She'd think that was weird, but before Rui got a chance to do that, her head started to go misty. The world around her spun, twisted, until black flames burned away the environment around her. It left her with nothing but an empty void, at which point Rui felt all strength leave her body and collapsed.

---

~~Kajitsu's Butterfly 華実の蝶~~

In the next instant, her eyes snapped open again as she was somewhere completely different. Somewhere familiar. Rui was standing in front of the entrance to the playground she visited earlier in the day... but not only that, somebody else was standing in front of her. Another girl, one with strange clothes and two animal ears were twitching on the top of her head. "Gooood morning! You're my new Commander, huh?" the girl said in a cheery, upbeat tone.

"C-...Commander? What are you talking about? Where are we? Who are you!?" Rui replied, a bit panicked from the sudden shift in scenery. The other girl waved her hands in front of her, seemingly in an attempt to calm Rui down.

"Calm down, calm down, it's fiiine! I guess you could call this place, um... your memories?" she sheepishly answered. "As for me, well, I'm your new Avatar from today! My name is Lumia and it's nice to meet you!"

"My... memories?" Rui could only respond with confusion in her voice, looking around the area again. Nobody was here except for the two of them.

Lumia looked apologetic, scratching the back of her head as she said: "Well, it's no wonder you're a bit confused right now... here, look at this," the animal-eared girl said, opening the palm of her hand. Inside were seven small, golden coins which floated up in between the two of them. "We're in this place because there's a strong memory associated with it. Each of these seven coins contains a memory of the past. Some of them will turn black soon, and when that happens, you'll no longer be able to recall them, but..."

"Wait! What are you talking about?! Why would I... how do you expect me to believe something like that!?" Rui yelled back at Lumia, overwhelmed by the situation. "Even if that's true, you... how could you do such a thing?" she angrily snapped at her.

"Wait, please calm down okay?! It's not all bad!" Lumia desperately attempted to placate Rui. "Even if you can't remember right now, some of these coins will remain gold. You'll keep those memories. If you want to get the others back, you have to look for and battle other Commanders in a game of Nexus... if you win, one of the coins turns gold. If you lose, another one of your memories is lost when the coin turns black. And, if you turn all of them to gold, I'm allowed to grant you a wish! Any wish, honest!"

"That's... no, I don't want to!" Rui yelled back, defensively hugging herself. Lumia shared her sad look.

"Ahaha... I guess you wouldn't, huh? However... you were chosen. Even if I don't want to, I don't get to choose this either..." the girl said, swiping her hand to the side. One of the coins slowly burned out its colour, turning its lustrous shine an ashen black. Rui felt a sharp pain course through her head.

"Please... stop... I don't want this..." she begged, but Lumia was just as powerless to stop it. Rui clutched the sides of her head as another coin turned black. She could see the images of her past vanish and burn out before her eyes, faces of people she knew get muddled and irrecognizable. Four coins had tuned black so far and another one started to turn. Rui looked up around her as the playground started to fade, flickering away slowly as if being erased from existence. "No... I..." she fumbled for words she couldn't find. A little distance away she saw a little Rui and a little Sora. Rui was crying, but she couldn't remember why. Sora was hugging her.

"...?" She couldn't make out her own words.
"...!!" Neither could she Sora's.
"...promise...!" Only a little snippet of hers made it through at all.

"Promise? What promise?" the adult Rui muttered to herself, desperation written clearly on her face as she dropped to her knees. She could see herself smiling and hugging Sora back. She felt an empty sting inside her heart. "It's important to me, but... I can't remember..." Rui continued to babble, burying her head inside her hands. The coins stopped turning black; five had turned in total, leaving Rui with only two. Lumia and her were left in nothing but an empty void. Rui couldn't see how the other girl was looking down at her with pity.

"From today, you're my Commander. And... I'm sorry."

Nexus: The battle for one's memories.

"New ice cream parlor. I'll reheat dinner." was her brother's response. Rui dropped her arm to her side.

"Well, I guess he's just like that..." she wistfully muttered to herself. She felt a bit uncomfortable laying down, though. "Ah, right... my coat." Rui mused, pushing back against her bed to get off it. She changed out of her uniform, then shuffled over to her working desk. Some light rehearsal in the short time she had before dinner couldn't hurt, she thought. Though she took the initiative, fatigue settled in even before she got to work. It was the same routine every day. Going through her notes right before school, diligently paying attention to class, then when she got back home she studied some more. Rui opened one of her textbooks, on the page she left off at, with some notepaper next to her to write on. Her pencil smoothly slid across the surface of her paper, the movements like an automaton. The minutes ticked by as she mindlessly memorized, up until her mother came into the room.

"Dinner's ready, Rui."
"Mm. I'll be right there," she replied without meeting her eyes. When her mother had gone away, Rui looked up at the ceiling and let out a sigh. She got up and joined her family at the dinner table. The food looked good and she thanked her mother for making it, but no matter how tasty it would be, her mind would always be elsewhere.

"Did you get any test results back today?" her father asked, as usual.
"No, not today. I think we'll get some at the end of the week," she half-heartedly replied. It was always the same song-and-dance. Rui's mother gave her a compliment because she'd seen her study, Rui thanked her and then father would point to saying just hard work wasn't enough. She needed to make absolutely sure her results stayed at the top of the school. This conversation always played out between the three of them and Rui could do nothing but nod along. She briefly shot a look at the empty seat next to her. It was doubtful the conversation would've played out much differently had someone been seated there.

Rui didn't want to spend too long at the dinner table. She excused herself as soon as she'd finished and retreated back into her room, back to her desk. Back to her studies. Back to endlessly writing down the contents of her lessons. It wasn't just enough for the girl to get good grades; everyone expected her to get the best grades. So Rui rehearsed her lessons just one more time and when she was done, moved on to the next. Then the next.

"I'm so sick of this..." she bitterly mused to herself, but didn't stop working. Even if she hated it, Rui didn't have much choice but to keep going. Her parents wanted her to excel, so she obeyed. That's all there was to it.

Secundi Lux

Chie observed, as was in her nature. She watched each other candidate- Rivka, Crystal and Selma- perform feats beyond her. 'How?' she thought. 'How does it come so naturally to them?'

Chie had her arms crossed from the start, her face neutral as she kept her gaze fixated on the trials. Even so, if an attentive eye looked her way it'd notice Chie squeezing her arm every-so-often in the middle of the team's performances. Each of them positively shined as they dispatched their enemies effortlessly. Chie doubted she could do the same; up to now, the other three had been looking out for her. She didn't- couldn't do much on her own. Today, though, she was going to have to prove herself. Prove herself to Rivka and Crystal, standing not far from her, the three of them observing Selma's rampage down below. 'Selma looks like she's having fun...' Chie continued being lost in thought. She glanced to her side. 'Crystal and Rivka too. All of them enjoyed themselves...'

Selma didn't take long to finish up. The shockwave of Selma's axe crashing down on the last remaining enemy gave birth to a loud crash that could be heard even within the safe confines of their observational window. Whoever was on the other end of that earpiece she worse must not have had a fun time with that.

The living mountain of a girl returned to the group soon after her display. Naturally she'd already transformed back to her usual self. Selma was in high spirits; It's no surprise after the showing she gave. "That was amazing, Selma!" Chie complimented her, much the same she'd complimented the other two. A few more superficial pleasantries escaped her lips. It wasn't like Chie didn't feel happy for Selma, but she couldn't muster much more than shallow words of praise. Chie was full of doubts about herself, ever as she had been, and it affected even her ability to be truly happy for others. Even if she should be overjoyed her friends are doing so well, the envy in her heart had taken deep roots. Chie couldn't think about it for too long; after all, her name was called not long after Selma's return. "Yes, I'll be right there!" the girl replied, hurrying off towards the designated practice location. Chie heard her fellow candidates encourage her. The words didn't truly register, though.

She didn't have the time to appreciate their feelings.

The air was thick at Chie's spot. Even before the Nox levels were lowered for her, she could feel its oppressive aura. Maybe it was some remaining pollution of the previous trials, maybe it was her nerves. Either way, only one thing mattered: this intense pressure. It made her feel miserable and sick, much like the surgery had done to her. Something buzzed in her earpiece. "Three. Two. One..."

It was beginning. The floodgates were opened ever-so-gently, to let the ambient dark creep in. Every little bit of Nox that reached Chie came paired with a haze that filled her head. The city-scape had already been ruined, even moreso after Selma's display, but her nox-addled mind turned the devastated imagery into a more desolate and pitiable sight than it had been before. Chie grit her teeth and clutched her head with one hand.

'Endure it.'

Dark creatures formed from masses of corruption swirling around in the area. Sharp pains shot through Chie's entire body.

'Endure it...'

Chie peered at her enemies through her fingers. They looked human, too human for her liking. Before she thought they were terrorists, but now she knows they're just monsters. It's fine. She didn't need to be scared of them anymore. The prospective Ars Magi's body started to shake. Her breathing became ragged, she could feel the sweat forming on her skin. One of the monsters saw their chance to strike upon witnessing Chie's damaged form.

'ENDURE IT!'

---

---

Chie's armagus reacted in the nick of time to save her skin. It shone- as they do- with a light bright enough to stun even the mindless automaton which tried to dig its claws into Chie. She could feel the corruption being changed- reshaped- into something entirely new. It wrapped around her head, fingers, legs, chest... Chie didn't have time to admire herself, but she knew something had changed about her. Unfortunately, as brief as her transformation was, the nox creatures weren't thrown off for long either. Chie jumped back, just barely fast enough to dodge a claw of the front-most one. Well, those were different at least. The ones from before had normal hands, but these monsters were built to kill. Their figures were more slender with claws long enough to reach halfway down to the floor. These were built to kill.

Unfortunately, it wasn't alone. Two- no, three more of the same creature had formed around Chie. God only knows if any appeared where she couldn't see them. The situation was unbelievably bad, despite being able to think with a much larger degree of clarity now that the fuzz in her head was gotten rid of. 'What do I do?!' Chie thought to herself, mildly panicked, as she continued to just barely scrape by the attacks coming from multiple directions. She hadn't even summoned her Gladius yet- not that she knew how- to strike back at them with. Fight or flight kicked in full-force. Chie was surrounded and needed to get out of there first before doing or even thinking of anything else. She made a dash straight for one of the creatures. Moving her body sideways, she narrowly avoided what would otherwise have been a really nasty strike. Then-

*SLAP*

...the palm of her hand made contact with the creature's face, stunning it as she took her chance to dash past it. Of course, the others were still hot on her heels, but at least they were behind instead of in front of her now.

'Think of something! Think of something!'

Chie tried to feel the nox around her, letting it envelop her being as she siphoned it through her armagus. She couldn't keep running, yet she stockpiled and stockpiled until...

"STOP!"

...she released it in one big burst, creating a strong field of gravity to pin her and the creatures both to the ground. She couldn't keep on her two legs, going down on her knees from the sheer force of what she'd created, but at least now Chie had a little time. Powering through it, Chie tried to gather the nox around her again. She managed to pry her two hands off the ground for long enough to let it collect in their palms, gaining a new shape. Two chakrams, one for each hand. Their sharp edges didn't dig into Chie's skin, which was a good thing, because the pair had no handle to grip. She was hoping for something a little more, well, conventional, but at this point the girl was glad to have anything to fight back with at all. The creatures of nox were slowly rising onto their feet, fighting through Chie's field, so it was time to go on the offense. "Release!"

As soon as the force dispersed, Chie jumped back and tossed out one of her new toys. Her aim was clumsy, but the surprise timing caught one of the four creatures off-guard for long enough to not be able to dodge the strike. The weapon sliced clean into its side, not enough for a mortal wound, but it brought it back down to its knees. She could worry about finishing it off later; the other three had to be neutralized first. The chakram she tossed out didn't keep going in the direction it was thrown in but instead pulled to the side and then back to Chie.

'A boomerang effect!'

Chie caught her chakram on its return. She defensively held them in front of her, parrying one of the creatures' lunge through dumb luck. She took the opportunity to slice it at close-range, putting enough force behind her strike to finish it off in one blow. The monster recoiled in pain and dispersed into thin air. 'They're weak! I can do this!' Chie thought to herself, the girl's confidence surging. She dashed away again, focusing. She gathered nox to create a singular point ahead of her with lowered gravity. She dashed for it, desperately, and the moment she reached her goal, kicked off the ground in an attempted backflip. The lowered resistance helped her to get airborne. Her stunt was dumb, reckless and unpractised. Despite that, whether it was through luck or the power gained from her transformation, Chie managed to control herself mid-air well enough to toss her two weapons behind her. They spun around, digging into and killing yet another assailant, as Chie started to go in freefall behind the other one.

'...No! Damnit!'

Unfortunately, not having a natural talent for acrobatics, Chie couldn't quite manage to stick the landing. Instead of coming down clean on her feet, Chie had overshot her jump and slammed onto the street with her back. The two chakrams dug into the pavement next to the candidate magi, one to each side. Desperately, Chie pushed herself somewhat straight with one of her arms. She quickly threw out the other, free arm in front of her. The remaining nox creature attempted to lunge at her, but the girl was quick enough to create another focused point of increased gravity right before it managed to reach. Using so much of the same, unpracticed magic in such short intervals was mildly exhausting, but Chie didn't have another option to choose from. The humanoid slammed into the floor before it could reach Chie. It tried to push itself off, making some progress initially, but Chie kept increasing the pressure. She felt herself starting to be pulled into the centre as the point became heavier and started to exert its influence. The creature's figure snapped against the stone, being unable to move as cracks formed underneath it. The monster couldn't muster the strength needed to break free anymore.

"And... stay down!" Chie said, clenching her fist. The nox creature's body dispersed into thin air, unable to withstand the sheer force it had been pressed down into the pavement with. Chie slowly undid her handiwork, gradually reversing the effect of the gravity field. As she did, she breathed a sigh of relief. 'I did it...' she thought to herself, letting her body relax.

Then she felt a sharp pain shoot through her back.

"AAUGH!" she screamed out, instinctively grabbing one of her chakrams and rolling forward. Her now-hazy eyes looked back, seeing the first creature she had injured towering over her. Even though it was limping, its claws were dripping with her blood. Chie weakly tossed her chakram at it, the effort enough to slice clean through and disperse the adversary into thin air. Chie got to her feet, albeit unsteadily and held herself as she breathed heavily.

"It hurts...!" she complained to herself. She stretched her arm a little, just barely managing to reach the wound with the tips of her fingers. It stung, obviously, and when she pulled her hand back she saw red. Argh, she was such a mess! Why couldn't Chie do anything right? The other three must think her to be pathetic. She had to transform and hurry back to get it treated. She didn't know how long she was going to be able to keep upright with a nasty gash in her back.

Fire Emblem: Sunken Flames

You've seen me on this thread. I'm keeping an eye on it, but I'm not making any promises of actually attempting to join.

Nexus: The battle for one's memories.

~~ Nichijou 日常 ~~

"It's cold today too, huh...?"

Rui clutched her scarf a little as she walked down the streets, her bag in the other hand. Her home was close enough to not have to take the train, but it was still a few minutes worth of walking. Not that she wanted to rush it; if anything, Rui was walking slower so she could avoid it for as long as possible. She paused at the corner of one of the many walkways she passes through daily. "Maybe I'll go this way, just for today..." Rui told herself, taking a slight detour from the usual. She felt the road less travelled more familiar than her daily routine. And, looking down another street, she knew why. She went off-course again, stepping foward to a location she hadn't visited in a while.

"..."

Contemplative and silent stood Rui in front of the entrance to a playground, a public pen for young children. Nobody comes here much anymore, but Rui's lived in this town long as she can remember. She and Sora used to come here so much. She was the older of the two, yet could never keep up with his energy. He was so much better at the climber, and still bars... Rui often just sat on the swings and watched. Her glasses were a little foggy, but she wasn't looking much at the location as it is. Rui was caught up in her own mind, smiling softly at the warm memories as she tightened the grip on her scarf just a little more.

"Is this place special to you?"

Rui jumped ever so slightly as the unfamiliar voice next to her snapped the girl out of her trance. She turned her head, seeing a masked boy having suddenly come stood next to her. He wasn't looking at Rui, keeping his gaze turned at much the same location she had been staring at. "Um... I guess so. Just a little," she answered him. A brief pause, then she posed a question of her own: "What about you?"

He still didn't turn to look at Rui. In fact, the boy barely moved a muscle save for raising his chin up a little. "Me, huh...? No, not really. Or if it was, I can't remember." he said. Rui felt awkward. She didn't know this person and he hadn't given her a name either. She'd ask, but that mask unnerved her. He was a weird person, but she couldn't just run away either. After a bit, he finally turned his head to Rui. She could just barely make out his emerald eyes beneath the holes. "My apologies for disturbing you. Something about you... no, nevermind. Memories are precious. Whatever you were thinking of... keep it close to your heart. You should hold onto your past, no matter what."

After his cryptic (and weird!) speech the boy turned away from Rui and walked off. She had questions; a lot of them, even, but didn't have much heart to press them. Rui looked back at the playground. "...I'd never forget. Even if you hadn't told me that," she muttered to herself, irritation at the idea welling up inside of her. She didn't want to forget.

---

"I'm back, mom!" Rui shouted into the entryway of her house as she immediately began to take off her shoes.

"Welcome back, Rui. Dinner is almost ready." she heard coming from the kitchen. Rui stepped down the hall, towards that place. The girl stared at her mother's back as she stirred the pot. It smelled like Curry.

"Um... what about Sora, mom? He's not home yet," Rui asked timidly. His shoes weren't there.

"That boy always comes home late. He can reheat his dinner later," she curtly told her.

"I see... I'll be in my room," Rui said, darting off to drop her bag and throw herself onto the bed. She felt so bothered. So bothered! Rui shot a glance down to her stuff on the floor and reached out to fumble for her phone. She still had that texting window open to her brother. Rui turned around on her bed, laying now with her back against the sheets. She began to type another text, and this time, actually sent it when she was done.

"Are you far from home? Mom's almost done with dinner. She didn't wait to hear from us."