Pat pat. "She didn't say no."

"Yeah. I'll be good and wait. Then I'll be a lion with claws!"

"Sharp little kitty."

"All kitties should be sharp!"

"And so you will be."

"I won't claw you, though, unless you ask nicely."

"I don't think I'll do that."

She just laughs. "Then I guess I won't!"

"Thanks?"

She giggles. "I'm a polite lion, you know."

"When you want to be."

"Really only do things when I wanna, so..."

"Yeah."

She hums happily.

"What do you wanna do after dinner? I wanna read some of sensei's books."

"That sounds good. We can she what she has that we didn't."

"And if we have anything she doesn't!"

"Possible, I guess."

"That old jerk had a lot of really old books, so I bet we've got a few," she says, confidently. ('That old jerk' being their absent father, naturally.)

"Could be. Professor Curtis is real good, though."

"Yeah. I think the library's the size of our whole house!"

"Yeah, it's really big."

"My own teacher's is larger," Akira says, sounding amused.

"Wow. Where do they live?"

"She's actually pretty nearby - pretty far in the woods, but this is the nearest big town to her. She'll want to meet you at some point, I suspect."

"I think we'd want to meet her too."