Getting to know you... (Joy.)

Bow listened intently, hanging on each word he spoke, trying to comprehend. However, even with focusing all of her mind on what he was saying, she still had questions. Not because she was dumb by any stretch of the imagination. Actually, it's quite the opposite, she wants to know everything there is and every little detail of what's being talked about. That's just the way she is. Though it's not a two way street and Kardus was sure to figure that out soon enough.

As he took his sip of water, she blinked as her first question came to mind. Maybe it wasn't the best question and minute, but she wondered. "Four steps? Why only four?" When he answered and then continued she nodded, thinking she got everything she needed to know. When he paused for another sip, she more restated him rather than ask a question, but still for clarification, to make sure she knew what she knew. "Sooo... You're a time traveler that can travel through dimensions as well... There's nowhere you can't go?"

When he finished, she blinked, and looked a little scared. "How long do you plan to stay here??"

Kardus responded to her first question with an explanation, "Well basically I can create portals between any two places; here, let me give my favorite example of how it works." He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a string and stretches it out. "Ok, let's say this string is like space... In order to get from one end to the other, you would normally have to travel the whole distance of the thread right? Well, wouldn't it be a lot easier if you just moved the ends together so that they touched, and then hopped from one to the other?" He demonstrated by putting the ends of the string together. "That's how my portals work; they take two places, and connect them together so that you can just hop from one place to another."

In response to her second question, all he had to say was, "Pretty much, ya."

When she asked her third question he smiled and replied, "Oh, a good long time; especially with someone here that I care about." He took her hand to reassure her that he wasn't about to leave her; then added, "To be honest though, I've already left and come back about twice. The nice thing about being a time traveler is that you can leave a place, be gone for as long as you like, and then come back to the exact moment you left. You're never missed that way."

Bow watched and listened, loving the demonstration. She continued to listen through the rest of it, soaking in every piece of information he shared. Her eyes never left his until he touched her hand. She looked down momentarily and smiled softly. She then looked up as he finished explaining. She giggled. "Well... I'm glad to hear you're not leaving me... And I guess it's true that even if you did, I may never notice, huh? How very interesting... I feel like you've shared a lot... Is there anything specific you'd like to know about me?" She hated talking about herself, but she felt like she wanted to tell him.

Kardus chuckled a bit, "That's really not much about me at all, but it's the basic idea of who I am." He let go of her hand and leaned back, thinking for a moment. "Well, for starters, what exactly is a 'Blue Lantern', and a 'Titan'? They both sound a bit familiar, but I'm not exactly sure what those are."

Bow looked shocked, forgetting that he may not have ever even heard those terms before. "Oh! A Blue Lantern is a person, or creature really, considering it's not only earthlings that are invited to join. Anyway! It's someone that exhibits an extraordinary amount of hope. Hope enough that a whole world can rely on their word and hope in that one creature. This gives us our strength. Our hope, that is. And it's what we use to create things out of this emotion, this energy, in the form of blue hard light. Our powers are meant to protect those that cannot protect themselves and we're probably the least combative of the corps... The other emotion Lanterns that is... *giggle* I won't get into all of that though! Anywho! Titans... We're a special team of teens that have formed to also protect the humans from bad guys... Just another superhero team really. But they're my family. I love each and every one of them like a brother or sister!" She wasn't very good at leaving pauses for anyone to ask a question in.

Kardus listened to her explanation until she was finished, not wanting to interrupt her; then smiled. "Alright then, that makes sense." His expression changed a bit, and he looked down at his hand. It had some strange, glowing lines on it that seemed to be changing. "Strange...hold that thought for a minute..." He got up, leaving his drink on the table, then walked off into a portal. For a moment there was nothing, then another portal opened and he came back out again and sat down; "Ok then...where were we? Oh yes, you just explaining what a Blue lantern and a titan were. Now let's see, what was I going to say?" *Short pause.* "I can't remember."

Bow looked at the lines and blinked, confused. She was about to say something when he got up and walked through a portal. A sense of dread and worry washed over her for the moment that he was gone. This was gonna take some time to get used to. She let out a sigh that she didn't realize she had been holding and giggled. She giggled again when he forgot what he was going to say. She smiled softly and spoke, looking at his hand. "How about you tell me why your hand just glowed like fifty fireflies dancing around it?" She looked into his eyes curiously.

Kardus looked at his hand for a moment, "Oh yes; that. Well basically I've got this thing in my hand. I don't know what you would call it; it's kind of a multi-purpose tool; like a scanner-type thing I suppose. I found it kind of bothersome to carry around, so I just put it in my hand for ease of access." He set his hand down again; "Anyway, that kind of thing is unusual; I don't normally just leave when I'm in the middle of things." He picked up his drink; "The reason it glowed like that was because Caroline was having some...issues. She needed me, so I went to take care of her for a while." He stopped to take a sip of cola.

Bow listened to him curiously, paying attention to every word, nonchalantly eating as he spoke. When he said that Caroline was having issues though, she jumped up, almost knocking over her soda, and went wide eyed. "We should still, be... there... Wait... Exactly how long were you there with her? Because you could have stayed there a thousand years and I wouldn't know the difference, right?" She sat back down slowly, looking at him as though she was comprehending, but it was still trying to compute.

Kardus nodded, "Yes, that's right. But it's fine; I was only there with her for about two days. She's feeling good now; back to her normal self again. She may even be feeling better than me." He finished off his drink.

Bow blinked, tilting her head in slight confusion. "What do you mean she may be feeling better than you? Are you sick? You should go home and get some rest if you are!" She looked at him concerned with wide eyes.

Kardus chuckled a bit, "No, I'm not sick at all. All I meant was that Caroline is feeling really good right now. There's no need to worry about me." He meant it for the most part; though there was something very small and dark tucked away in the back of his heart. It didn't seem to affect Kardus though, and he smiled genuinely to Bow.

Bow still worried, because that was just the type of girl she was. If anything was brought up, she will worry about it, and even more so if someone tells her not to. However, she tried not to show it, and succeeded for the most part. She smiled sweetly to Kardus. "Okay then, I'll try not to... *giggle* So, when do I get to meet Caroline anyway?" As curiosity and excitement took over, she really did start to worry less.

"We can whenever you want. When you're done with your chicken we can go right over." Kardus said as he got up and threw his empty cup away.

Bow looked very excited and gobbled down the rest of her food and washed it down with her drink. She then turned a little green. "T-that wasn't my smartest decision... *giggle* But now we can go see Caroline!!" She smiled brightly as she walked slowly to throw her food away.