(Untitled)

[candied_rabbit]

Being Bound is getting old, Momiji thinks. He's enjoyed the vacation - really! - but now not seeing the rest of the Zodiac is starting to feel incredibly weird, in an almost visceral way

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[im_so_sari]

A skinny seven-year-old girl with bright red hair, dusky skin, and Indian features* eyes the drifts of paper curiously. "What'cha drawing?"

* That's 'Indian' as in 'from India,' rather than 'Native American.'

[candied_rabbit]

"Some of my family," Momiji answers, shifting from his somewhat hunched over position to glance over at the girl.

And, in the process, revealing that he has a very cartoonish idea of what seahorses are supposed to look like. They're hard to draw!

"A bunch of my cousins, mostly."

[im_so_sari]

"Your family has some cool pets!"

[candied_rabbit]

"Sort of!"

The boy giggles at that, flashing a wide smile, before quickly shaking his head from side to side.

"Not really, though. They're not pets or anything, they're just..."

He pauses for a moment. This is not something that lends itself well to brief explanation! So, he just snickers, instead:

"Members of the family, too, I guess."

[im_so_sari]

"...you have a cousin who's a seahorse?"

[candied_rabbit]

"Only sometimes."

Momiji figured the "members of the family" bit would be a little ambiguous, but it really shouldn't surprise him that someone in Milliways would take it literally.

"I mean, he's only a seahorse, sometimes. He's a doctor, usually."

He taps another, white crayon lightly against the paper, indicating the sketch of the man in a lab coat.

[im_so_sari]

"Really?" the little girl looks puzzled. "Is it, like, magic or something?"

[candied_rabbit]

"Yeah!"

The blonde tilts his head up and down in an earnest nod.

"It's a family curse - he's supposed to turn into a dragon, really, but he always gets zapped into a seahorse, instead."

[im_so_sari]

"...how'd he end up with a seahorse instead of a dragon?"

[candied_rabbit]

"Uhm! We don't know? Except seahorses are called baby dragons, where I'm from."

He shrugs, a terribly amused smile quirking his lips upwards.

"So, it's like the curse is making a bad joke, kinda!"

[im_so_sari]

"Who wants a curse with a sense of humor??"

The fact that no sensible person wants a curse of any sort is conveniently ignored for the purposes of this conversation. :)

[candied_rabbit]

"I dunno. It'd be a lot worse if he turned into a real dragon - like everyone would notice, and he'd light stuff on fire all the time."

Sari will have to excuse Momiji for a moment as he grins and chuckles over the mental image of his stoic cousin scorching the drapes by accident.

"A funny curse is better than a mean one, like that."

[im_so_sari]

"I guess," says Sari dubiously. "But don't seahorses only breathe water? So if he changes and he's not near water he could suffocate!"

[candied_rabbit]

"...Yeah, that's a problem."

The rabbit-boy tilts his head to the side a tad. The practical challenges of occasionally poofing into a sea creature (or, for that matter, a bunny) are something he doesn't think of often.

Getting too fixated on the weirdness isn't healthy, after all.

"He just has to be really careful about not transforming."

[im_so_sari]

When all of your friends turn into cars on a regular basis, transformation is on your mind a lot.

"How does he do that?"

[candied_rabbit]

"Well, the Curse only works if he bumps into a girl. Or gets hugged by one or something."

The slight awkwardness in Momiji's shrug says that, no, this doesn't make any sense to him, either.

It's just that the Zodiac is allergic to cooties, probably.

"So, he just has to keep an eye out, when any of them are around."