Ben is silently grateful for Cho's talkativeness. That was always something he'd like about being around Klaus; the two of them balance each other out, and Ben doesn't feel so guilty for being inclined towards quiet. And it is particularly helpful now, when he doesn't feel up to much talking, himself. It's nice to just... listen. To learn things about someone without having to ask a million little follow-ups. As she speaks, and catches that little turtle, the awfulness and tension that have built up in Ben begin to loosen and unravel, by small degrees.
It's easy to picture her life, the place she is from, with the way she describes it. Ben can practically picture it. Her family must be extremely wealthy, from the sound of it. Wealthy, but not in the way that Hargreeves had been. The kind that involved active business, a corporation, everyone involved in maintaining it. And it sounds like there's a lack of freedom that comes with that. Privilege, but also constraint. He can relate to that, in a way. It's all so different, in the particulars, but there are echoes of his own life that are impossible to miss.
"So you want to save the world."
Though succinct, it's not an unkind summary of what she'd said. He can see that it isn't just ethical treatment of animals she's passionate about. There is this, too. She's a person with convictions, who believes in doing the right thing. Despite, from the sound of it, not really being raised in an environment that encourages that. Ben admires that.
Something moves in the corner of Ben's vision - something close, and he startles. He'd stopped in place beside a small fruit tree of some kind. Evidently, an extremely tiny mouse had been in its branches and had decided that Ben's shoulder was the new hip happening place to be. It is glowing a faint marigold color, and Ben stays perfectly still as it wanders along his shoulder, down to explore the hood of his sweater.
Cho's right to wonder how these things are surviving. Where are this little guy's instincts? Doesn't he know what sort of a creature he is climbing on?
"Uh, little help here?" Ben's voice has become tight and strained again, though not quite so bad. He can feel the tiny movements of the mouse in his hood, but doesn't dare try to get it out himself.
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It's easy to picture her life, the place she is from, with the way she describes it. Ben can practically picture it. Her family must be extremely wealthy, from the sound of it. Wealthy, but not in the way that Hargreeves had been. The kind that involved active business, a corporation, everyone involved in maintaining it. And it sounds like there's a lack of freedom that comes with that. Privilege, but also constraint. He can relate to that, in a way. It's all so different, in the particulars, but there are echoes of his own life that are impossible to miss.
"So you want to save the world."
Though succinct, it's not an unkind summary of what she'd said. He can see that it isn't just ethical treatment of animals she's passionate about. There is this, too. She's a person with convictions, who believes in doing the right thing. Despite, from the sound of it, not really being raised in an environment that encourages that. Ben admires that.
Something moves in the corner of Ben's vision - something close, and he startles. He'd stopped in place beside a small fruit tree of some kind. Evidently, an extremely tiny mouse had been in its branches and had decided that Ben's shoulder was the new hip happening place to be. It is glowing a faint marigold color, and Ben stays perfectly still as it wanders along his shoulder, down to explore the hood of his sweater.
Cho's right to wonder how these things are surviving. Where are this little guy's instincts? Doesn't he know what sort of a creature he is climbing on?
"Uh, little help here?" Ben's voice has become tight and strained again, though not quite so bad. He can feel the tiny movements of the mouse in his hood, but doesn't dare try to get it out himself.