o1 👼🏼 video;

[kidsmenu]

Bon soir. I am Claudia de Lioncourt.

[Small, blonde, extremely curly. A little more articulate and staid in her manner than your average twelve-year-old girl. She's wearing a flowery T-shirt and a backward, pink baseball cap.]

I am seeking information on how family relationships mature as a child grows up, in this world and time. In my old world, it would hinge on marriage, and childbirth, and separation from the ancestral home. But it seems that times have changed. Or perhaps they never were.

I'm given to understand that ImPorts don't tend to have children or anything, but I'm open to hearing stories gathered from the natives. Or your other cultures. Apparently, there is a saying, 'when in Rome.' And it would seem there are infinite versions of Romes to choose from.

Comments

[coppelganger]

I don't know, honestly. I'll try.

[kidsmenu]

Would you keep her a little girl forever, if you could?

[She asks lightly. Pretending it's lightly meant.]

[coppelganger]

Shit, no. [ Oh, wait, kid. ] Sorry. Just—in some ways it'd be nice, I guess, but I wanna see her grow up and be whatever she's gonna be. It does kinda suck knowing she won't always want to hang around her mum, but that's what you sign up for when you have kids, yeah?

[kidsmenu]

I don't know, [Claudia answers, at length.] I suppose... I suppose people don't always seem to know what they've signed themselves up for. Or they have a very different understanding of what the... ah. Fine print, is.

I mean it sounds like you gave it quite a bit of thought before you had your little girl.

[lol;;]

[coppelganger]

[ If she were talking to someone older, she might admit that no, she never thought about half this shit until long after Kira was born, and that she still has no idea what she's doing most of the time. She's talking to a kid, though, so she just shrugs. ]

Something like that. [ ANYWAY... ] So in your world, you're meant to get married before you leave home?

[kidsmenu]

Yes, that's traditional, [Clauida nods. A beat.]

Well, it would have been. But I have-- some other circumstances. [The moment it's out of her mouth, Claudia kind of regrets it, hesitating visibly on the screen. But she can't help it. Women who are mothers, and who are beautiful-- they kind of get something different out of her.]

[coppelganger]

Yeah? [ She doesn't want to pry, but she leaves it open if Claudia wants to say more. ] That's okay. [ Well, she has no idea if it's okay or not, but what else is she supposed to say? ]

→ private;

[kidsmenu]

Well—

[more hesitation. But then she dials over into private. They're all ImPorts, she reminds herself. Sarah will have seen weirder things.

And besides: she's a mother.]

I can't grow up. Not like normal girls. Not like your daughter.

[coppelganger]

You can't—are you dead?

[ That's the first place her mind goes to, considering how many imPorts are. ]

[kidsmenu]

[The little girl's face is very careful.] In a manner of speaking, yes.

[coppelganger]

[ God, Sarah is Not Equipped for this conversation. ]

A lot of people here are dead back in their worlds.

[kidsmenu]

Are you?

[Her eyes glitter vampire bright.]

[coppelganger]

Not yet.

[ It's supposed to be a joke, ha ha, but it definitely falls a bit flat, not least because she's not actually joking about it. ]