Slow and Steady (Open)

[Richard]

Richard could sense that Alain was sort of sensitive about the subject of his hair from his reaction to the question. Maybe sensitive was too strong of a word. It was more of a feeling that it was something that came up to often in a conversation. Richard was not sure if he should keep the conversation going in this direction, but Alain did it for him.

<<I usually try to cut it myself with some scissors and a mirror. If it looks weird, then I just flatten in down and no one is the wiser.>> Richard always wanted to ask someone why hair does not grow back to full length after morphing. Was it because of the image that people focused on? He wasn't really sure, but he figured if he focused on it too long that his head might explode.

Richard fluttered off of Alain's head and landed in front of him so that he was looking up at him. <<Do you ever wonder where any of us are going to end up after this?>> He meant after the whole conflict of the Yeerks versus the Animorphs, but he didn't specify in case Alain knew what happened to them after they graduated.

[Alain]

Alain looked down at the little bird that was his fellow trainee. What a loaded question that was. He leaned back against the wall and let his head be supported by the hull of the ship. "No, I try not to," he answered honestly. He wasn't sure if they were headed towards anything good but the world was a pretty scary place right now. There were more sad endings than happy ones and, probability said, they weren't heading toward's a place they wanted to be. Especially the ones who had chosen to fight.

But if he thought about that too long he just got distracted and stopped thinking about all the things that needed to be done now, things he could do and could effect. Maybe his actions would effect what happened in the future, well, maybe the rest of his actions since he had already affected the course of the war once. But he wouldn't amount to anything if he sat around thinking about what he could do instead of actually doing it.

"What about you?" Alain asked, looking back down at Richard.

[Richard]

Richard figured that was how Alain was going to answer. No one really tried to think about what it was going to be like after everything was said and done, but he figured that it couldn't hurt to ask about it on occasion. Richard was one of those people who couldn't help but think about the future since he didn't know if he was going to really have one. For all he knew, the Yeerks could find them tomorrow and that would be the end of it. He hoped it wouldn't happen like that, but it was still possible.

<< Oh, I sometimes think about during my free time. I either see myself as being a really good magician's assistant for little kids or the perfect person to live in a nut house. It is a toss up at this point.>> It was sort of a joke, but sort of not at the same time. He really didn't think that he could go back to the was things were before all of this. Richard would probably end up trying to find a way to stay involved in this whole mess to try and keep some level of normalcy in his life.

[Alain]

Alain got a thoughtful expression on his face as he heard of Richard's future plans. He didn't know the first thing about being a magician's assistant but the dream sounded so...normal. He wasn't sure if they would ever get back to normal but suddenly it didn't seem like such a bad idea to hope they would. It was a lot easier to fight for a life as a magician's assistant than to fight for concepts like freedom and justice and honor. Who knew what those things meant? And he felt like it would be all too easy to lose sight of who you were if you tried to live by things like that.

So he tried to think of what he would want his life to be like after the war, even if it weren't possible. He thought back to his time in the refugee camp for inspiration. "I want to open my own brewery," Alain said after a moment. "And I want to make enough money so that I can buy my own boat. Nothing big or fancy, just a little sail boat that I can take out sometimes."

[Richard]

<< Sounds like a good plan. Do you think the Animorphs have a good retirement package?>> Who was he kidding? The best retirement benefit that any of them could get was not to be dead when this whole conflict was over. At least they could all remain a little bit sane as long as they planned to do something afterward. If they just sat around and did nothing, then they might as well just wear a sign that says 'I am going to snap at the first weird sound I hear'.

Richard wondered if any of the instructors thought about what it would be like to not have to fight the good fight anymore. Would they return to the lives they were living or try to find a peaceful place where they could not be influenced by any government? His head was starting to hurt from all this thinking, so Richard started walking in a circle. It was a small circle to a person, but a big circle to a bird.

[Alain]

Alain sighed and wiped off his hands as he sat up from the wall. The fatigued feeling had been slowly fading while he talked to Richard and he figured he was ready to morph again. He wondered how many morphs he could get through in a day and then wondered if it was really wise to try to find out right now.

"Well maybe I should go now. Do you want to demorph before I start my morph?" he asked, looking down at the bird that was hop-walking in the way birds do. "Or do you want to stay a magpie? I don't think any of my morphs would really bother yours but it's up to you."

[Richard]

Richard watched as Alain got up from the wall. He was going to morph something for practice or something like he had been doing. << You go ahead and morph. I am going to get a feel for this morph for a few more minutes.>> Richard was in no rush to demorph as it was cool being an animal and not having to worry about anything at the moment.

Just to be on the safe side though, Richard flapped his wings so that he could land on what looked like an emergency light. Alain had said that none of his morphs would probably see a magpie as food, but it was always good to be careful when morphing. Richard did not want to end up some other person's food just because they assumed that something wouldn't attack something else.

[Alain]

Alain thought about morphing his meerkat but he'd done that already today and his beetle was out as well. He had no desire to be food any more than Richard did and he wasn't sure what magpies ate so that left his otter. Which he didn't mind. His otter was one of his favorite morphs. It was so calm and carefree. Otters were like the children of the animal world, or maybe the teenagers. Happy and hyper without being goofy. He liked them.

He got down on all fours since he'd had way too many experiences with falling down while morphing and began the morph. The first thing to change was his hair, oddly enough. It sucked back into his head until it was much shorter than it had been. Then a thick layer of fur began to grow all along his body just in time to cover the layer of fat that was growing under his skin. For a moment Alain looked like a fatter, hairier version of himself before he beginning to shrink.

His arms and legs shrank first but since he was on all fours it was like riding an elevator down towards the ground. He felt the now familiar sensation of growing a tail though this tail was good for swimming and not just balance. Webbing grew in between his fingers and toes as his nails grew into sharp, tough claws.

Whiskers sprung out on the sides of his nose though his mouth didn't have to change shape that much. Otters didn't have much of a muzzle so he hardly felt it but he did feel his ears rotate up to the top of his head.

Soon enough he was done with the morph and the otters relaxed and playful mind was bubbling up under his own. <<Alright, wish I could hang out with you,>> Alain said to his morph before beginning his demorph.

As quickly as the changes had begun they now began to reverse themselves. Even has he regained his human body he could feel the same fatigue from before settling in. "Wow, that's tiring," he said when he was done.

[Richard]

Richard's bird eyes watched as Alain prepared for his morph. It seemed like a good idea to stand in the position that the morph would eventually end up being in as it would keep the risk of injuries down to a minimum. For the first few seconds of Alain's morph, Richard was glad that he had a bird's facial features as it seemed really funny to see Alain grow fat and hairy all at once. He knew it shouldn't be, but his mind just couldn't help but think that laughter was the appropriate response to this type of situation.

In all the morphs he had seen so far, Richard was not sure what Alain was morphing. At first, he figured it was a rodent, but the furry tail kind of persuaded him to expand his list. Then the web feet thing made his mind think of a platypus, but no bill showed up. It finally hit him that it was an otter which seemed like an interesting choice.

As quickly as Alain had morphed the otter, he started to demorph back to his normal self. Richard assumed this was because he was still testing the morphing fatigue thing that he had mentioned earlier. He figured that it was an appropriate time for him to demorph as well, so he glided to the floor and began the process.

It took a few minutes, but Richard was back to being a normal human by the time that Alain had said that morphing again had been tiring. "Maybe you should take a longer break before morphing into anything else. It is not wise to over due this early into your Animorph career."

[Alain]

"Yeah, I think you're probably right," Alain said as he took a rest. It was a little odd to be sitting on the floor in a room that was obviously built for standing or sitting in chairs. It wasn't like just sitting on the mats in a gym and it wasn't nearly as comfortable but Alain was too tired to care.

"Maybe I should quit for the day," he said, looking over at Richard. "Want to pick up something from the mess hall?" It was the first time he'd invited a fellow recruit to share a meal with him though he wouldn't mind if Richard said no. It just seemed like a normal thing to ask.

[Richard]

Richard was sort of surprised to hear Alain ask him if he wanted to go to the mess hall. He figured that Alain was sort of the loner type seeing as how he was always kind of quiet during most of their combat classes. Then again, combat class wasn't really the type of class that one would talk in.

"Sure. All this morphing sure does work up an appetite." Richard was glad that Alain and him were sort of becoming friends as the case could be called. It was probably good to start that kind of thing now just in case the two of them were sent to the same location upon graduating.

[Alain]

"Alright. I hear Jullian's up as far as the cooking rotation goes." Last night a few of the scientists Alain had met his first day here had been gossiping about the chores. Jullian liked to cook, or at least, strongly believed good food helped everything. But that didn't mean he could actually cook, which didn't stop him from trying. If he could be convinced to keep it simple the food normally turned out ok, maybe even delicious. He had achieved that level of skill. But more often than not Jullian liked to experiment and the results were always interesting but not always edible.

Alain explained all this to Richard as they walked through the halls toward the mess. "So I hope whatever it is isn't too bad," Alain finished as they entered the large room. The usual sparse crowd was inside. Alain had never seen the mess empty nor full and had grown used to the relaxed atmosphere. "Let's go check it out."

[Richard]

Richard was not sure how to take the notion that Jullian was on cooking duty today. From the academy's gossip network a.k.a. the Staff, Jullian was good at cooking some things that didn't require any training, but Richard had been advised to never ask him to make a four course meal or he would end up in the medical bay. He followed Alain to the mess hall, which seemed to have the same amount of people in it every time he came in there. Alain was restating some of the thing about Jullian's cooking that he had heard from several other people, but he let Alain keep talking. He thought it was best not to stop the guy when he was on a roll.

"So we've got a sixty percent chance of waking up in our rooms and a forty percent chance of tasting something edible today. I like those odds for some reason." Probably because his stomach was like a tank. It could take a lot of damage before actually being stopped. Alain wanted to go and check out the food that was prepared. Richard didn't want to seem to eager to try Jullian's cooking then he might have to comment on that. He didn't want to be put in that position, so he would let Alain be."Lead the way."

[Alain]

Alain nodded but then looked around the mess hall. Everything was just so quiet and normal. In all the time he'd been here the mess hall had been the same. Sometimes there were late night poker games going on and once Alain had even walked in on a game of strip poker when he'd come for a late night snack. Unsurprisingly Adrian had been in the middle of of it. Alain had even been convinced to stick around and he was a decent poker player so he'd walked away with nothing too revealed.

But he felt the irresistible urge to shake the mess hall up. He turned back to Richard with a sly look in his eye. "You have a cockroach morph right?" he asked, a little surprised at what he had in mind.

[Richard]

Richard looked around the mess hall and found that nothing was out of the ordinary except maybe the color of the food, but then again he was no cook so it was possible that they looked completely normal. He wasn't really that keen on keeping up with what everyone did while they were eating or what not. It seemed creepy if someone did that, and Richard did not want to be seen as creepy to anyone. Alain had asked him something about his morphs. Richard thought it was whether he had a cockroach morph or not.

"Yeah, I have a cockroach morph. Why? Are you planning something?" Richard did not know if Alain was going to suggest a little more practicing or to do something that they weren't supposed to be doing. Either way, Richard was up for whatever idea Alain was cooking because he figured the mess hall could use a little excitement.