this is dumb and I wrote it last night in one go. THERE IS A VAGUE DESCRIPTION OF A SPOILER CHARACTER so if you are avoiding SPOILERS do NOT READ THIS!

"Why'd it take so long for you to pick up?"

The question was the first of what would no doubt be many lobbed at Razputin Aquato by his younger-by-fourteen-months-sister. "I'm at work," he replied in a low whisper, looking down at his current assignment laid out upon his desk. He wasn't doing anything particularly labor intensive at the moment- just going through a pile of small, seemingly random objects with Psychometry, trying to see if any of it could be used as evidence in some upcoming legal case. "It's good practice," the department manager had said. More like busy work, Raz had thought. "I can't just stop to talk anytime I want. I have important things to do." These things, which he had previously deemed 'stupid' and 'boring', had suddenly increased in prestige when he'd been told that someone claiming to be his sister was on the line asking for him.

"Really?" Her tone implied she didn't think much of his 'important work'. "Well, sorry for bothering you, I'll call some other time if you're so busy."

"Uh." Annoyed as he was, he did not actually want her to hang up so soon. "Mirtala, I-"

"No, no," she said, interrupting, "It's cool, bro. It's not like we're always traveling and thus don't have regular access to a phone line."

Raz rolled his eyes, his sister's sarcasm not lost on him. "I'm sorry, okay? Don't go." He picked up a screw, rubbing it idly between his fingers. "Where are you? Are you at a pay-phone or something?"

"Yeah, there's a phone booth near where we're setting up the tents," she replied. "This call's costing me my allowance money. Hence why I asked why it took you so long to pick up."

Razputin decided not to remind her that he'd just sent her money last week. If she's calling to ask for more I'm definitely hanging up. "Well, I am at work," he said, sending a quick glance over to the other intern sitting at the desk next to his. He was facing forward and bent over his work, the custom-made wheel-chair (basically a lawn-chair balanced on top of a levitation ball) pushed as far into the desk as it could be, seemingly too focused on his task to pay any attention to what Raz was doing. You could never be too sure with this guy, though- sometimes he pretended to ignore you when in actuality he was monitoring your every word and action through some method Raz had yet to figure out, waiting for the exact right moment to cut in and catch you off your guard with an unsolicited suggestion or observation. "But it's fine, we can talk." He paused, and then added "for a little while."

"Are you sure?" Mirtala asked, elongating the word 'sure'. "Because I can call you some other time, you know? Like tomorrow. Or next month." There was a short pause, and Raz imagined that she was shrugging her shoulders on the other end. "Whenever I'm free from my job."

"Dang, alright, Mirtala, I get it," Raz replied. She could be so dramatic sometimes. "Next time you call I'll pick up immediately. Answering you will be my first priority, even if the base is under attack by Super-Intelligent Mutant Crocodiles. That sound good to you?"

"I guess so," Mirtala answered simply.

"Super." Raz leaned back in his chair, a loud creak accompanying his movement. "So what'd you call for?"

"To talk to you. Why else?"

Raz supposed he should have expected that from her. "Is that really it? You just wanted to talk to me?" That was sweet, if it was true. Raz doubted that it was.

"Yeah."

Raz waited a moment for her to continue. "Did you have anything you wanted to say to me?"

"You mean specifically?"

"Yeah."

"No, nothing specific."

"Then why did you call me?" Raz asked again, exasperated.

"I already told you why," Mirtala said, cooly, unfazed by her brother's annoyance. "I want to talk to you. That's not weird."

"I never said it was weird, Mirtala."

"No, but you implied that it was with your tone," Mirtala pointed out. "We came out of the same woman, Raz, it's not weird for me to want to talk to you every now and then. You're weird for thinking it's weird."

Raz winced at his sister's choice of words. Sometimes Mirtala said things that were just...ugh. "Alright, whatever," he said, not wanting to continue an argument that would just go on and on pointlessly. "How are you?"

"I'm alright."

Raz tossed the screw onto the desk. It bounced off of a plastic hamburger toy and fell onto the floor. "Good to know," he said as he floated the screw back into his hand. "How about everyone else? Are they alright? Are they alive?"

"Yeah they're alive," Mirtala said. She made a humming noise, and then continued. "Frazie got her nipple pierced and it got infected."

"What!" Raz stood up, shocked and horrified by the news and the casual way Mirtala had delivered it to him. "What the hell? Is she okay?" His eyes darted to the door, and then back at his desk. Would Hollis be willing to give him time off if his sister was deathly ill from a botched piercing? He wasn't sure.

"I guess she's alright," Mirtala said. "She's up and walking around, but sometimes she grabs her boob and goes 'ughhhh'. I think it hurts or something."

It was a relief to know that his older sister hadn't died of something so stupid. "Why'd she get that pierced anyway? She's got an entire ear that she hasn't done anything with," he said as he sat down. He looked over at the other intern again, and saw that he was still hunched over his evidence pile.

"I don't know, you should ask her, if Mom lets her come out and use the phone. Which she probably won't, since she's really mad at her." Mirtala let out a short 'hah', the closest she ever came to giggling. "It's actually a funny story. We'd just finished a performance last night and Frazie did really bad on the trapeze. Like really, really bad. Missed all of her cues and almost fell onto the safety net. Really, she did worse than you did that time you tried to perform with your eyes closed." Raz narrowed his eyes at the unnecessary reminder of that disastrous performance, but didn't interrupt her story. "Anyway, we were coming out of the tent, and someone, I don't know who, I think it might have been Dion, bumped into her and hit her right on the piercing. Raz, she screamed louder than you did when you saw what Queepie did to your secret collection of Sasha Nein Photos! Right in front of everyone, too."

"Oh my god," Raz muttered, rubbing his eyes.

"Yeah. Surprised you couldn't hear it." Mirtala continued on with the rest of the story. "Mom came over and dragged her back to the caravan, and Frazie was all crying and stuff. There was a lot of yelling and I guess Frazie's not allowed to perform til it's better."

"Wow," Raz said, both disgusted and impressed with his sister's behavior. "But she's okay? She's not dying or anything, right?"

"No, she's not dying," Mirtala said, not sounding very sympathetic to their sibling's plight. " But wound was apparently kind of green. I dunno. I'll let you know if her nipple falls off or anything."

"Gee, thanks." Raz shook his head, kind of nauseated by the thought.

I wouldn't worry too much about it, the other intern supplied telepathically without raising his head from his desk. Plenty of people get by with only one.

Raz did not know if the comment was meant to be reassuring, but he did know that he didn't appreciate his co-worker eavesdropping on him. Again. "Dude, seriously?" he asked, raising an eyebrow at him. The other boy turned and gave him a wry smile, not remorseful at all.

"Are you talking to your girlfriend?" Mirtala asked.

The question brought Raz's attention back to the conversation. "What? No, that's not her."

"Oh."

The syllable was heavy with disappointment. For some reason, Mirtala was really interested in Lili, always asking him tons of questions about her whenever the subject of his girlfriend was brought up. He didn't know what the reason for this was, only that it made him kind of nervous, so he quickly changed the subject. "How's everyone else? Does Dion have the plague?"

"No, he's fine. He's moping right now, I think." A second passed, and then, "I think Mom and Dad are making a replacement for you."

"Oh my God." There she went again, saying things that were like a verbal punch to the face. "Wha...how...why are you saying that?" Raz sputtered, leaning forward to rest his elbows on the desk. "I thought Mom was still making Dad sleep in the stables."

"He is. But I've been seeing her go out to the stables at night lately."

"Ugh."

"I don't know for sure yet though. I guess we'll know in like, three months?" He thought he heard a thump on the other line, like she had just leaned back against the wall of the phone booth. "I mean, you can't really blame them. You might not be coming back to perform with us. And I mean that in the sense of you sticking with the whole Psychonauts thing, not because I think you're gonna die or get seriously injured. Knock on wood." Three quick raps followed this statement.

Raz mimicked them on his desk, just to be safe. "Yeah, I guess you're right about that." He wrinkled his nose. "But ugh, that's gross. You didn't need to tell me that, Mirtala."

"Why not? Why's it gross?" Mirtala asked, her tone innocent.

"You know why it's gross."

"No, I don't. We all gotta come from somewhere, Raz. The stork didn't bring us all to the caravan."

"Mirtala, stop!" It seemed like sometimes his sister said things like this just to make him uncomfortable. "I know that!"

"Maybe the stork brought you," Mirtala continued, heedless of her brother's growing discomfort, "but I was created and born the way nature intended."

Raz had officially had enough. "Okay, thanks! Thanks for all the...updates. But I really have to go now!" Before you say something that makes me want to throw up. "Tell Frazie that I hope she gets better soon! And she should go to a professional next time she wants a piercing! Bye!"

"Wait!"

The shout came just before Raz slammed the phone back down. He hesitated, letting the phone hover above the receiver for a moment before bringing it back up to his ear. "What?" he said tentatively, certain that he would regret this course of action.

"What's Lili's phone number?"

"What?" Raz blinked and pulled the phone away from his ear, uncertain if he heard the question right.

"Tell me what Lili's phone number is."

"Why do you need to know?" Raz asked sharply.

"Because I want to talk to her. Why else would I ask for her number?"

"What do you want to talk to her about? You haven't even met her yet."

"I'm going to tell her that she's too good for you, and that she should dump you immediately and date me instead."

He couldn't tell if she was serious or not. "Well in that case, I'll give to you," he said. "You got a pen and paper?"

"I'll remember it," Mirtala said. "Tell me what it is."

"It's 555-Y-O-U-S-U-C-K," Raz answered, thinking himself very clever and funny for this response.

"Ha-ha." Mirtala didn't seem to find it as witty as he did. "Well it was worth a shot, right?"

"Not really," Raz muttered. Was that the real reason she had called him? It wouldn't be too surprising if it was.

"I'll let you go now, I guess," she said. "Bye, bro. Miss you, love you and all that other stuff."

"Yeah," Raz said, his irritation fleeing now that the call actually was about to end. "Love you too. Call me whenever, okay? Even if I'm at work."

"Okey-dokey." And with that, she hung up.

It was perhaps five seconds after Raz put the phone back on the receiver that the other intern decided to add his two cents. "Your family is interesting," he said, not unkindly.

Raz shrugged, feeling a little melancholy as he wondered if he'd get an opportunity to see them in person in the near future. Probably not. If he was lucky, maybe Mirtala would call him again tomorrow.