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Yeah, not one.

( not even close. )

I can't even remember going on pony rides as a kid, you know? We were always right in the middle of the city. Not great for animals.

Yeah. Me either.

[For pretty much the same reason, though speaking of pony rides--]

I've been thinkin' I should try and learn to ride a horse, though.

[It's easy enough to get around in the city on foot, but it'd be nice to have options for longer range travel if necessary in the future.]

Yeah? You're gonna have to let me know how that goes. Walking's pretty much my only option.

( easiest thing to when he was blind. )

Ever gotten on a horse before?

I'll let you know if I survive. I've never even been close to a horse, and that's probably been for the best.

[He's heard they can sense nervousness and so he can only imagine horses will hate him, which is why despite knowing he should learn to ride, he hasn't even tried yet.]

Don't have much experience with animals in general, actually. Did you get to play with the little winged cat things though?

[The ones brought to the hospital in Cadens after the whole pit incident.]

I was kind of out of it when they were around. I think I touched one or at least heard one.

( which, you know, was something. he was in and out of consciousness during that whole ordeal. )

Heard they were pretty cute though. You got to play with them?

Yeah, just for a short time though.

[For various reasons, from Jayden spending as much time in the Horizon as possible to running around whenever he had opportunity to then crashing whenever he overdid it. But he'd played when them when having to stay a night after returning to Cadens.]

I think Istredd's got one in his Domain. I might have to put one in mine too.

[In case Matt wants more opportunity to play with them. Jayden hadn't thought much about making animals in his domain yet, aside from intending to make a few to show Hilda, but the little butterfly cats were strangely calming.]

Edited 2023-05-23 17:30 (UTC)

I've got a dog in mine. Wanda created him for me so now she lives in my Horizon and sometimes hers.

( first dog he'd ever had and while it was a magical dog only existing in one place, he still loves. )

Named Mary. After Hail Mary...

( something that matt knew very well. )

[Two equally pressing questions war briefly in Jayden's mind, as he's torn between asking if Matt is religious and what type of dog he has. Both very interesting, but in completely different ways.

But the latter is easier to ask later, and so he focuses on the former instead.]

Catholic?

How'd you guess?

( he laughs though and then nods. )

Born and raised. Kind of lapsed, if I'm honest, but can't take the Catholic out of the boy, I guess.

That's what I've heard, but I didn't grow up religious, so it's not somethin' I've ever really understood.

[He doesn't say it judgmentally--he has no problem at all with people being religious--just factual and a bit curious. It's one of those things that is so meaningful to a lot of people but he only has secondhand experience with.]

I grew up with it and I guess I just never left it behind. Guess that happens when you grow up in a Catholic orphanage.

( religion kind of becomes part of your life. )

I pray, I believe, but I'm not gonna be smiting people or anything like that.

Yeah, I imagine that'd do it.

[He mentally files away that little bit of info, but doesn't ask further; since Matt volunteered the information it's probably not that sensitive, but that doesn't mean it's not a jerk move to pry.

Instead--]

Is that weird, with being here? Knowin' there's magic and apparently gods or somethin'?

[And an angel, apparently, though Jayden decides not to mention that just yet.]

It's a change but it's not weird. It helps that, before I ended up here, there were some weird things going on back home.

( avengers, invasions, aliens, that sort of thing. it was hard to stay grounded and disbelieve in the supernatural after that. )

So, I guess I was kind of prepared for something bigger and weirder.

Yeah? What was going on in your world?

[He's curious now; Matt is the second person he's spoken to who seems to have had a relatively recent change in their world's weirdness levels before arriving here.]

Depends on the day. But, we'd recently had an alien invasion that nearly levelled half the city.

( thanks, avengers. )

Got my office on the cheap because of it.

Aliens.

[He repeats it flatly, both because it's unbelievable and because it's strangely... Not. Maybe just because aliens are somewhat more plausible in his own world than a whole lot of the stuff he's seen and heard about here, but then again he's starting to get used to the sort of things that happen here, so that makes aliens more unusual.

...He's gong to stop overthinking it.]

Never thought about the effect aliens might have on real estate.

Yeah, aliens.

( matt knows how it sounds and all he can do is laugh at how flat jayden sounds. )

Don't ask me much more about them because I don't know. I mostly just kind of...tried not to get killed while it was all happening.

Understandable.

[Jayden gets that sentiment, since that's basically all he'd done in the pit. There's only so much of a shock that someone can take, but he doesn't want to think about that, instead commenting lightly--]

My world's startin' to sound really boring compared to everyone else's.

[Which is not necessarily a bad thing, but still.]

What's your world like?

( can't say a thing like that and not expect a follow up question. )

Probably a lot like yours, but without the aliens. Or anything else supernatural or paranormal, if you've got any of that sort of thing.

[They seemed to share a lot of general similarities between worlds, if the fact that they knew the same locations, could discuss schooling, and those sorts of things are any indication. At least he hopes their worlds are similar, anyway, because it'll be a lot easier to explain.]

The aliens are a new thing, admittedly.

( but it had definitely opened the world up to a lot of other things that were starting to show up. matt had been trying to ignore it as best he could but —

kind of impossible. )

Nothing supernatural or paranormal at all?

Not as far as I know, or society in general knows, anyway. I guess there could be all kinds of things that are kept under wraps.

[It's not the most farfetched idea, after all, and although he'd been more likely to dismiss those sorts of beliefs when he was younger, working for the FBI and seeing some of their more secretive projects had made him a little more open to the idea. Then being here, and experiencing the pit so soon after arriving, has completely shattered any sense of skepticism he might've once had.]

Well, guess one good thing about this place — if you can call it that — is that you'll be prepared for that weird stuff if it does happen.

( maybe? he's not sure if memories rae retained when you leave this place but he's gonna try and be optimistic. )

You won't be the one freaking out too badly.

Yeah, I'm not sure I'm gonna freak out about anything ever again, honestly.

[Which might be a good thing, might not be.]

Yeah, I'm pretty sure this place just...desensitizes you to pretty much everything.

( good thing? bad thing? it's definitely a thing. )

And we say that with the knowledge that we might not have seen it all just yet.

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