xp_logs | Hank, Rahne, Thursday evening

In which Hank gets a present, and Rahne gets confused.

Hank grinned, slipping out o his room. Scott couldn't hide forever, he had to be around somewhere... although as he rounded the corner, he was quite distracted from his search by almost bumping right into little Rahne, who had a package in her hands. "Rahne!" he said, beaming at her. "Good day to you, my dear!"

Aha. Rahne, for her part, had been prowling in search of Hank for some minutes, since while hiding the gift in the medlab area had kept her from having to go back to her room for it, she'd ended up deciding to give it to him while he wasn't actually there. She smiled. "There ye are. I was looking. And happy birthday to you."

Hank brightened even more. "Thank you!" he said happily, accepting the package. "I really am being spoiled today." He pried the wrapping paper off carefully - he'd never liked just ripping into presents.

It turned out to be a sort of homemade scrapbook of comic strips labeled "Freefall, by Mark Stanley," starring an odd and vaguely duckbilled alien, a round robot, and an upright, talking wolf. They had been printed out and carefully laminated into the notebook. "'Tis a webcomic," Rahne explained. "I admit, the wolf's why I first looked at it, but it seemed the sort of thing ye might like. The author doesna seem to sell paper books as some do, so...."

Hank blinked and smiled, very touched. "Thank you, Rahne," he said softly, flipping carefully through the book. "You must have put a lot of time into this. It's very sweet of you." There was nothing quite like a present someone had spent time making for you.

She smiled. "I hope ye like the story."

"I'm sure I will, and I love the present." He smiled, reaching out to pat her shoulder. "Thank you, very much. And congratulations again on your hunting, by the way. I don't know what we would have done without you and Kyle providing for us." He grinned. "Eaten a lot of pizza, probably."

Rahne grinned at that. "I ken it was not exactly necessary, but 'twas fun."

"And Lorna was so much happier over venison than filling the whole school with junkfood." Hank grinned. "She was upset enough over losing her kitchen. Losing her kitchen AND having to serve us all Bad Food would just have broken her heart. And made her very angry and inclined to stab people, too."

"Lorna wanting to stab people is a very bad situation," Rahne agreed. She leaned back against the wall. "And I have to say watching most of the first deer disappear in one meal was impressive. And also fun."

Hank nodded. "It was very tasty, too." He smiled. "Although I wasn't in the best condition to appreciate it, I do remember liking it very much."

"There's still some of the second one left. I think everyone was craving protein after the invasion or something -- slowed down a lot after."

Hank nodded. "Then I shall find some more of the second one, later." He grinned conspiratorially. "For now, I'm going to find Scott," he whispered. "He has a noogie coming to him, and he's trying to hide. But I'll get him."

Rahne raised her eyebrows. "I'd say I could try to track him -- but that might spoil the fun. Besides, I think I could get in more trouble with him than ye could."

"Very true. I'll track him alone." Hank snickered softly. "I'll follow the trail of dropped paperwork." He patted her shoulder gently. "Thank you for the gift, Rahne, it's wonderful. And keep up the good work in looking after all of us."

She looked up at him, vaguely confused -- she tried, a bit, but didn't really look after anyone as effectively as it seemed much of the rest of the mansion did. But there wasn't much point arguing. "I'll... see what I can do. And I'll try not to foul the paperwork trails."

"Good." Hank smiled at her, and hurried back to his room to put his present in a safe place. Under his breath he muttered quietly, a gleeful grin on his face. "I'm going on a Scott hunt... I'm going on a Scott hunt... I'm going to catch a sneaky one... I'm going to catch a sneaky one..."