(no subject)

[rightchoices]

Who: Lee Everett and Naomi Wildman
What: History and kadis-kot lessons.
When: Now'ish?
Where: The library.
Rating: G or PG, at most.

It wasn't until he'd started putting together lesson plans that Lee remembered how much he really missed teaching. It was one of those things- an echo of normal life, before his court date and trial, before the Walkers had risen and started trying to kill everything in sight. Naomi reminded him vaguely of Clem, too -- at least as much as he'd spoken to her over the journals, young and earnestly eager to learn. It was nice- maybe he'd spent too much time around jaded university students.

But he'd be waiting for her in the library, notepads and three books piled on the table next to his elbow, different chapters marked with post-it notes in a half dozen assorted colors. He'd had a lot of free time on his hands.

Comments

[minicaptain]

Naomi wanted nothing more than to be useful and to do that, she had to learn things. Learning was an adventure to a girl who was stuck on a starship with limited mobility and allowance to meet new people. Her friends were holograms, a former Borg drone whose only human memories before she'd been liberated from the Collective were of her six-year-old self, and a man called Neelix who had never even known Earth existed until Voyager arrived. Being a half-alien girl who was born in space gave Naomi a unique outlook on life in general.

The first noticeable thing about her would be the horns along her forehead, horns which she thought of as normal. She heads to the library at the appointed time, hesitating a little bit, but not too much as she moves inside. She doesn't know exactly what he looks like, but she's looking for someone with a lot of books, so when she spots someone who fits that description, she moves closer. She's holding her kadis-kot board against her chest.

"I'm Naomi. Are you the person who's going to teach me?"

[rightchoices]

He might have been surprised, once upon a time, at the sight of the horns on her head. Since arriving at the castle, though? Lee has seen way weirder, and he just stands up as she approaches, tipping a head her way. He's tall, dressed smartly, even if he does seem a little awkward about her approach. He's used to Clem, but his students were typically college-aged; this was going to be a learning experience for them both.

"Yeah. It's Lee, and you're- Naomi, right?" A moment's pause, and then he offers his hand to shake. "Board looks complicated there."

[minicaptain]

She nods in response to his question and then shows him the board a little better. "It's not very complicated once you get used to playing." After all, a three-year-old can play it. She pauses for a minute before placing the board on the table. "Are we having a lesson first? Mom used to tell me to learn something before I could play." Usually learning things and playing went hand-in-hand, but it's the thought that counts, right?

[rightchoices]

This game is going to be a lesson for me, he nearly remarked, but he was supposed to be the teacher her, right? So Lee simply nods, gesturing to the chair across the small table from him. "I think that'd be best. What were you most interested in learning, Naomi?"

[minicaptain]

She's taught a lot of people how to play since she got here and an ex-Borg drone before that. Honestly, she's just happy anyone will play with her at all. "Science," is her immediate answer. "Mom's a xeno-biologist. But I'll learn anything. History's okay, too."

[rightchoices]

Lee paused for a moment, considering her answer. "Can't say I'm so great with science. I know the basics.. but not much more than that. Pretty good with Earth history- American, specifically, but we can go wherever you'd want to from there." He tipped his head at her, conceding. "We could learn together, hm?"

[minicaptain]

"That's okay. I don't know anything about Earth's history." And she's more than willing to learn, as evidenced by the smile and nod she gives his question. "Yes. I would really like that. Can we start with something about Earth first and then play a game of kadis-kot?"

One would think she was using the game as a reward for learning something, but she's really just so excited to learn something new that her old game can wait.

[rightchoices]

Her smile gets one from him in return. He's relaxing - this is more his normal element, or at least had been before the undead had taken the streets over. He slides her a folder. There are papers inside - timelines, headers, all early American history. "Here.. I've written some basic history down. The founding of the country that I'm from. How about you read over that later today and we meet about it tomorrow to talk it over?"

[minicaptain]

Naomi nods in response, happy he's relaxing and that he's at all willing to help her learn things. "Okay!" She won't mind meeting him again at all. He's been really nice to her so far. "Is it okay if I ask questions if I don't understand something?"

She will ask all the questions. Earth is as foreign to her as the Delta Quadrant to everyone else here.

[rightchoices]

"That's what I'm here for." He smiles at her - still a little awkward, because Clementine and Duck are really the extent of his interaction with children in the past year - but he's trying. "Ask me whatever you'd like, okay? And I'll do my best to explain."

[minicaptain]

"Okay!" Naomi grinned as she glanced at the papers he'd given her. It all looked very interesting and she would be sure to read through it all. "Does this mean I can teach you kadis-kot now?"

[rightchoices]

"Absolutely." He smiled at her, tipping his head forward. "But you might need to go slow - I'm a little thick in my old age." It was a joke. Sort of. He was trying!

we can handwave a lot of the game and just have them talk!

[minicaptain]

Naomi couldn't help giggling at his joke, able to figure out that he was teasing. Or at least she hoped he was or else she might have just insulted him without meaning to. "That's okay. I've taught a lot of other people." And with a smile, she carefully launched into an explanation of kadis-kot.

sounds good to me!

[rightchoices]

Lee followed along closely, and despite his little joke, was able to follow her instructions without too many problems. "You been playing this for long?"

[minicaptain]

She had to think about that for a minute. For as young as she was, she'd been playing it a long time. "For as long as I can remember, but I think I'm only three. So... uh... a year, maybe?" It's hard to remember, exactly. "It's my favorite game and I play it whenever I can."

[rightchoices]

Lee stuttered almost visibly at her answer, trying to figure out the mental math. "You're only four?"

[minicaptain]

Three, four. Something like that. Naomi nodded. "The Doctor says I grow fast because I'm half-Ktarian."

[rightchoices]

And this was perhaps the biggest surprise to him that day. "That's.. pretty quickly. Half Ktarian, half.. human?"

[minicaptain]

Naomi nodded again, her expression nervous. "Ktaris is a planet, but I don't think it's a lot like Earth. I don't really know much about it. Mom was going to teach me this year, I think."

[rightchoices]

He smiled again, trying to soothe the nervous look from her face. "Well, you've got a lot to learn here. I wouldn't worry so much about that."

[minicaptain]

It worked and Naomi smiled again, nodding happily. "I'll learn everything I can while I'm here. Mom would want me to and then I can Neelix stories about Earth while he tells me stories about his planet."

[rightchoices]

Lee hesitated, had the feeling that he probably shouldn't pry, shouldn't ask. "What planet is he from?"

[minicaptain]

Naomi doesn't hesitate to answer. This is all normal to her. "His people are from Talax, but I think he grew up on one of the moons." Space travel and alien life-forms are all part of her daily routine. "I've never seen it, though. He joined Voyager before I was born."

[rightchoices]

And it was entirely fascinating to Lee.

"And Voyager was...?"

[minicaptain]

"A starship. That's where I was born. Voyager is my home."

She was coming to realize that she was different in that way. Home to her was a ship, not a planet, so talking about cultures and experiences and anything related to homelands was hard for her. She only knew what Voyager knew, the sum of its crewmembers, and with so many different people with different memories and experiences of "home," it was sometimes hard for her to sort out what she'd heard from what was "normal" to her.