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Tianara blinked. "Is it?" she asked, surprised. For some reason, she couldn't quite seem to keep her thoughts straight. "Oh. Whoops." She frowned into the distance for a second as she set the rest of the bags on the bed as well, a bit more carefully, but following his lead nonetheless.

When he asked his question, she glanced up, startled. Then she laughed a little, easily. "Am I that obvious?" she mused. "Yeah. I'm hoping Sorry and Nezik are within range. I need to talk to at least one of them. And I need to talk to Kiro." She didn't specify about what. Maybe she didn't think it was any of Joshua's business - it was easy to forget, considering how open she normally was, but Tianara was after all a sixteen-year-old girl who kept secrets of her own.

"But it can wait," she added quickly. "I'm just a little distracted, I guess. So. Heaters. Let's go." She turned and went back outside hastily, before she could be asked any more questions.

Tianara picked up what was left and followed him. After a little while, though, she started thinking in an absent kind of way about any number of things. Chief among which were how she was supposed to phrase her questions to Kiro - and how she would make sure he didn't talk to Joshua about it. She didn't know why she felt so instinctively that asking Joshua would lead to issues. She just did.

And considering that she needed to talk to Sorry and Nezik anyway - about how many were coming and how they intended to hide the influx, among other things - it was a good excuse to go down and talk to Kiro while she was at it.

Looking up, she blinked and realized that she had fallen behind. She hurried to catch up with him and smiled shyly at Joshua. "Talk to me?" she asked at last, sounding a little embarrassed. "I seem to keep getting distracted. I think I need something to focus on."

Tianara smiled at him gratefully, knowing that most people wouldn't have let her have her space for a little while. They would have been asking her questions. Everyone she knew was like that - they figured that if she was quiet, something was wrong. And even if something was wrong, she still just wanted to figure it out by herself.

The brunette considered for a few seconds, then smiled and said shyly, "Can you start with here? This is probably where I'll be starting out when I start to live on land. Tell me about...I don't know. The people, the history. What you know about it. I'd like to know as much as I could about the people I'll be living around."

She spoke with easy certainty. Even though they were on the brink of war, she was still able to hope that they could avoid it or avert it. And she'd never really considered that she - that those she knew and loved - might not make it through the war. So she wanted to know about life as it was.

For after.

Tianara shifted the heaters in her arms, listening to Joshua speak. As she had suspected, it kept her close to him and intent on the business at hand. But it also raised some unsettling questions in her mind.

A small town. A small, steady, stable town where everyone knew everyone else. That read, to her, like a place not too fond of strangers. Especially strange strangers, like her.

Rhiannon had made a life here, she reminded herself. So had Kiro. So had Mieka. But Mieka lived out of town - well out of town. Kiro had been with the family for a long time, ever since they'd checked out of hospital, and Tianara had yet to hear of anyone looking for him. It was possible she just hadn't heard, but still. And Rhiannon...well, she seemed happy, content enough, but she doubted the older woman was fully accepted by the others. She couldn't forget, either, how Joshua had been driven out by their mockery and now lived in the cove, away from everyone else.

"Joshua?" she asked uncertainly as they began to follow the deer trail. "Do you think..." She trailed off for a second. Her voice shook a little as she finished her question. "Do you think I should start out life here, or should I go somewhere else? Somewhere...bigger?"

Bigger places meant not knowing each other as well. Meant she could blend in quietly while she got comfortable.

But she would hate not being near her family.

Tianara sighed, dropping her head. "I don't," she admitted quietly. "I don't want to start somewhere else. I think I'm just afraid, because I don't really want to start anywhere. I liked my life the way it was; I don't think I'm ready to be a human, not the way I have to be." She smiled a little, sadly. "Maybe I should follow your lead or Allen's and be a hermit. People would never even have to know I was there."

This idea kind of appealed to her, but she said in a joking sort of way. Hopefully Joshua wouldn't take her too seriously. She didn't particularly want to be talked out of it.

Of course, to be a hermit and alone would mean never really settling in. She was a clannish creature and needed her social time, but particularly speaking, it would mean she wouldn't have the family she wanted so much. And the dream love she'd spoken of to Joshua would never materialize.

Her mind flashed for a second to an easy smile and cheerful talk behind a map store counter, but it skipped away just as quickly. There was no sense thinking about this now. Not when they were preparing for war.

"I guess I can talk to Kiro about it," she said finally. "He must have some ideas."

Tianara immediately pouted, going on a teasing sort of defensive. "I could do it," she retorted. "It would take some determination, but you did it, didn't you? And we're a lot alike. If you could manage it, so can I." Maybe she wouldn't be able to settle in, not the way she really should, but she would be...safe? Content?

Maybe, maybe.

"Speaking of Kiro," she mused, "I should try to contact that girl - his fiancée, I can't remember what her name was - at some point. She's probably really worried about him." In the girl's position, Tianara knew she would be. Honestly, she knew exactly where Kiro was and what he was doing, and she was worried.

Lost in her thoughts, she almost missed Joshua's warning. "What?" she asked, looking up. Curious about why she had to watch her step, she looked out at the water. Then she looked down and immediately went pale. "Oh. Oh. Um."

Turned out, a girl born and bred in the water didn't develop much of a head for heights. She pressed herself against the cliff as she'd seen Joshua do and began to inch along, but she couldn't seem to take her eyes off that drop.

Tianara's eyes were still glued to the edge, like she thought it would try to creep up on her if she didn't watch it every second. "Huh?" she responded very intelligently when she heard Joshua's voice. She was too busy wondering if this was how she was going to die to really hear what he was saying.

At last, she turned her head to look at him, though she kept the edge in her peripheral vision. She gave him a weak smile. "I'm okay," she promised. It wasn't as convincing as it might have been, however, considering that her voice was shaking. "I just...haven't been on the cliff paths this close to the edge before. I'll be, um, okay."

Her gaze drifted back to the edge, and she inched towards him a bit more. She kept looking from Joshua to the drop, but her eyes never entirely left the water crashing below.

Tianara merely inched up a bit more. She was coming to the narrowest part of the cliff path, and her paper-white face said she knew it, too. "I...No, I'll...I'll help. I just, um, need a minute." Step by painful little step, she made her way up until she was on the narrow area - not far below Joshua.

At his question, though, she gave him a sad look. "I do...have to, I mean," she muttered. She was so pale by now that she almost looked grey. "If we're going to live here..." Her eyes widened and she looked away from him as she realized how that sounded. "Shelter here, I mean, with - with the others...I have to get used to it."

She locked her eyes on the area where Joshua stood. Almost there. Almost there.

She repeated it like a mental chant until at last she was past the narrow area and almost beside the boy. It was almost over. They'd be at the cliffs soon.