so what happens now? [Milo]

[Alyss Heart]

After a rather heartfelt reunion/introduction in front of the school, Alyss felt like she needed to walk in, get a proper look at the place that, for better or worse, changed her life. Besides, it seemed only fair to give Della and Tori some bonding time on their own…poor Della seemed like she REALLY needed a reminder that there were absolutely still a lot of people in her corner, even if apparently her boyfriend had a new puppet master. Oh if she ran into Panic she was going to see if she could get some answers out of him. Alyss knew all too well what it was like to be constantly kept in the dark and she wasn’t about to allow that to happen to her friend.

But no, no need to get all riled up now, she might accidentally…

She heard the all too familiar sound of a card slicing through something, and realized that some had appeared from her sleeves as she was clenching her fists…she supposed it was just as well, it was making its way through some of the plants that had tried to take over the school building, but what if there had been another person here?? The last thing she needed was to get into the habit of slicing off heads.

Out of the corner of her eye, she caught sight of a rather familiar office door, and froze in place. How the hell the word “Headmaster’s Office” remained on that door was beyond her, considering with her Imagination’s Eye, she could see the ceiling had crashed down…she supposed its former occupant would have been quite pleased to see that at least his name remained under it. Probably not for long, if they were going to bring the school back and he was nowhere to be found…and why should he be? He had a whole world to go to, why would he miss this little school?

She shook her head, and turned back. She was pretty sure she saw a room that was cleaned up by now, that seemed a better place…somewhere she could properly collect her thoughts. Again, much as she adored being a mother, between that and her queenly duties, she hardly got any time for herself…if she was going to stay here (and she might just), she was going to take full advantage of Della wanting to make up for lost time with Tori. She’d make a fine babysitter, she was certain, even if she knew Della wasn’t positive of her maternal instincts…after all, neither had she been.

The room she had been thinking of, as it turned out, was the former staff room. It seemed almost immaculate, strange considering about half of the rest of the school grounds…she stood by the doorway, her thoughts circling…should she stay…

[Milo Thatch]

Milo had never been allowed in this room before. Technically, he thought, he might not even be allowed in here now; he still wasn't sure if he had a job here yet or not. But the room was in pretty good shape, he thought, running a hand along the back of a dusty but mostly-alright couch. He circled the couch, leaning down to inspect a few magazines that sat on a table in front of it. Gosh, it was like taking a step back in time, except...the things here weren't supposed to be as old as they obviously were. It was like coming back to your childhood home one day and discovering that all your belongings had aged a hundred years instead of the mere decade you'd been gone. Milo rubbed a thumb over one of the faces on one of the magazines, revealing the glossy cover underneath the dust, then stood back up straight and looked around the room.

There was a closet off to one side, which he pulled open and walked into, as it turned out to be pretty decent-sized on the inside. There were shelves still lined with various supplies; paper, pencils, bottles of ink. All pretty ordinary stuff that one would expect to find in a closet in the staff room of a school. Milo grabbed a couple of pencils, because you could never have too many pencils, tucking them into his bag. He had left his backpack in his old dorm room; he knew he couldn't stay there once the school re-opened, but he figured that when the time came, he'd go and scout out one of the residences in town, maybe find someone to room with. For now, he was walking around with his messenger bag slung over one shoulder, and it had enough room for him to pick up anything he thought might be useful or just shouldn't be lying around unsupervised.

He was poking through a box of assorted other supplies when he heard a step in the hall, and he stepped back out into the main room to see who it was. As it turned out, it was a familiar face. She was older too, but Milo recognized her immediately, from one afternoon back all those years ago when the two of them had engaged in the incredibly rebellious act of skipping a class Milo wasn't even supposed to be in to begin with. A slow smile spread across his face as he reached up to adjust his glasses.

"Hey," he said, grinning, "I know you. Alyss, right? Gosh, it's been forever, how are you?"

[Alyss Heart]

Her reverie didn't last terribly long, because someone appeared near the doorway. In spite of herself, she flinched, and cursed herself for it. Not every surprise is a danger, not every surprise is a danger... Fortunately she had gotten very good at hiding her surprise (or fear) from her face. One couldn't exactly rebuild a country after a war when one was so easily spooked. King Arch already believed that a matriarchy could never work, that women were too weak. She hardly needed to give him any more "proof" of that, or he'd wind up saying something terrible, and then chances were Tori would accidentally on purpose kill him with a bunch of Imagined cards, and they just didn't need that kind of international incident...even if sometimes Alyss imagined that scenario with a smile on her face...especially when Arch was talking. Whenever he did, really...

Fortunately, the moment the man adjusted his glasses and smiled, she realized she recognized him. Sure, he had... clearly gone through a second puberty or something because she remembered him being quite a bit skinnier the last time she saw him, dressed as Indiana Jones...but...it was pretty unmistakably Milo Thatch, wasn't it? And...gods, he hadn't seen her since before she was pregnant... that might require some explaining. Especially if Tori happened to decide she missed her mummy and decided to run away from Aunty Della...yeah, that sounded about right...but that bridge could be crossed later.

An incredulous grin crossed her own face as she walked further into the staff room. "Yes...gods, Milo, hi!" The temptation to hug him suddenly struck her, but...well, were they that good friends? Would that just be weird? This whole situation was weird, mind you, but..what would be acceptable? She decided to postpone the urge for now, and just smile. "How long has it been? I mean, from what I can tell it's different times for everyone, but...clearly it's been a while! The time's clearly treated you well!" Oh that was forward, wasn't it? She supposed she was glad she wasn't quite the blushing type. Gods, it had been too long since she interacted with people she felt she could speak freely with, that was the problem. "Or, you know, at least I hope so."

[Milo Thatch]

Alyss might not have been the blushing type, but Milo had no such luck, and when she complimented him, that became quite obvious. He could feel his cheeks burning with the sudden rush of blood, and he reached up to rub the back of his neck, looking towards the floor. He was certainly older now than he had been, but he had obviously filled out his once-lanky form in the past ten years. Alyss was the first person to notice, though, because she was the first person who'd known him from before that he'd actually run into yet.

"It uh, yeah, I've been pretty...healthy, I guess. I mean, I've been paying attention to what I eat, and...exercising and stuff, when I haven't been doing all the...academic things." Wow. Wow, Milo. Clearly the last ten years had done nothing for his ability to talk to women. At least she recognized him, he thought. At least he wasn't standing here making an idiot of himself in front of a girl who didn't even know who he was. Wait, no...that wasn't better.

"What about you?!" he practically blurted. "How's your whole...home...place been? How long has it been?" As he'd already noticed, she was older, too, so he imagined it had been about the same amount of time in her world as it had in his, give or take a couple of years. If he'd had to guess, he wouldn't have said she was ten years older, but...things around here were strange. The school had aged something like a century while Milo had believed he'd only been gone a decade. "You went home too, right? It's so...everything's so empty now, I guess we all did."

[Alyss Heart]

She offered a weak smile when she realized that Milo was feeling just as embarrassed by her compliment as she was for offering it. It seemed he hadn't changed much at all, not when it counted. She vaguely remembered him claiming he liked Twilight of all things, and then backpedaling not five minutes after. Perhaps she should have found that sort of behavior odd, but it just seemed like he didn't always know how to interact with others and...well, wasn't everyone guilty of that to some extent? And his version of that was almost endearing, somehow. At least his attempt to pretend to like something didn't last for over a decade, like her attempt to be Alice Liddell.

"Well great, it seems to have paid off...and me? " She laughed at his question, mostly because...good gods where did she even start? "Yeah, I wound up going home...I. It was an adventure, to say the least..." She thought for a moment, and then decided she might as well bite the bullet. "See, I was pregnant at the time, and Wonderland was being ruled by my evil aunt, so I had to raise a baby and take back my queendom for about the first year...luckily I'm queen now and things have been going well for the past sixish years..." It all sounded so strange to just...lay it all out at once. It had just been her life, and almost a blur, but when you put it all like that, it almost seemed hard to believe... "Crazy, huh? About as crazy as getting back here..." She smiled though, she could hardly have him thinking she wasn't glad to be.

[Milo Thatch]

She was queen now, huh? Well. That was just a trend with girls Milo knew, apparently. As far as he knew, Kida was back at home being queen of Atlantis, too, although he definitely hadn't gone there to verify that. If she wanted to talk to him, she would have talked to him before she'd left...unless she'd been sent back home like he had, in which case he'd probably run into her here soon enough if she wanted to come back through. There was a time when thinking about Kida would have sent MIlo into a spiral of self-doubt and shattered dreams, but he was older and wiser and it had been ten years. Milo had had an actual god pursuing him, it just wasn't reasonable to still be pining over the girl he'd fallen for when he was eighteen.

But wow, Alyss had been a lot busier than he had in the past decade, from the sound of it. "Gosh, wow, that's..." He didn't even know what to say to all that. "You look um...very regal, and...fecund."

Regrettably, that wasn't even one of Milo's infamous slips of the tongue, he had said exactly what he was thinking right there, and only after he'd said it did he realize what a truly unfortunate thing it was to have said. He put a hand over his face, wishing he could wish himself into a hole in the ground or maybe ten seconds in the past so he could slap himself in the face before he had a chance to say any of that.

"I'm so sorry," he murmured, cheeks absolutely aflame. "I hope your kingdom is doing better than my social skills. God knows it couldn't be doing much worse."

[Alyss Heart]

Milo seemed thoroughly impressed, although not quite in a way that made her uncomfortable. Besides, she hadn't really been given a chance to respond with her typical 'Please don't think of me as any different from you' or even a jokey 'No need to bow, I don't want that' when he had chosen a rather...interesting term for her alongside "regal". She supposed she could have been offended, but she was honestly so shocked at the word choice that she had to laugh again.

A giggle still in her voice, she answered, "No, it's fine, I know you meant it in the best possible way." After all, this had been the boy who asked if her chair was her "chest" when they first met. She could've read a lot into that slip, but Milo hardly seemed the type. Though she supposed you could never truly know...but she spent far too much time in her life being unable to trust anyone, but godsdamn it, she had quite enough of that.

"And well, we're still rebuilding. Almost two decades of an aggressive dictatorship is hard to recover from, but we've made great progress. I'm optimistic that we'll be just fine by the time Tori's gotten bigger...oh, that's my daughter..." Unable to contain herself (she was apparently THAT sort of mum), she pulled out her phone, clicking on the photograph that she had sent Della earlier. "I'll have to introduce you two. She'll probably think you're rather funny...and I'll scold her if I think it's in a mean way, of course...because your social skills aren't nearly as abysmal as you think they are."

[Milo Thatch]

Milo was well-educated in court protocol and all that; he had spent enough time in the presence of royalty that it didn't really faze him anymore. It wasn't that Alyss was a queen, it was that she was an attractive person who already knew how awkward he could be, which felt like even more pressure on him to not be awkward. She was also very nice about it, though, and just laughed at his bizarre comment. She was right, though; he had meant it in the nicest way. Milo wasn't a spiteful person, and unless someone was unkind to him (and sometimes even then), he generally tried to be as nice and inoffensive as possible.

"Holy cow," he said, "you've been so busy." He knew he didn't need to tell her that, she already knew, but wow, Milo had just been doing academic stuff for what seemed the entirety of his life at this point, so it didn't feel like he'd done anything revolutionary in his time away. Certainly nothing like repairing the aftermath of an aggressive dictatorship.

He peered at the picture on her phone, making an appropriate aww sound as he saw the little girl. "She's beautiful, just like her mother," he said, and was very pleased to find that he didn't turn any pinker than he already was from the first embarrassment as he delivered the compliment. "Still just me and my books and maps on this front," he reported. "Had some classes of students, but no little ones of my own. I finished my degrees, though, so there's that."

[Alyss Heart]

She smiled sheepishly at his shock of how busy she was. "Well, it was my birthright I suppose...and hey, you said you were studying this whole time? That sounds like quite a feat as well..." But then he looked at Tori's picture, and her smile turned into a full on grin. Any chance to talk about her little one was welcome to her, she was absolutely that kind of parent and wasn't the least bit ashamed of it. Most didn't seem to mind where she was from, given that she was the godsdamned heir to the throne of Wonderland, but she could easily see some being irritated by her obsession with her. "Thank you, I..."

But then she processed the last part of that compliment.

Oh.

Not that she hadn't been called beautiful before, both from those who were sincere, and those who wanted to use her to climb the ranks...but even if she had had an inkling Milo felt that way, she never would have guessed he'd say it so casually. He continued talking about his studies, confirming what she already thought. He had completed multiple degrees, apparently.

"There's that indeed. And like I said, that's quite a feat," she murmured, trailing off just a little, looking up at the man she would have been lying if she said she hadn't been slightly attracted to when they first met, but now...well. Perhaps this could be something...

She cleared her throat. "So, I presume you're going to teach here now? I'm considering it. It almost feels like it'd be a nice break from dealing with old men that don't know how to act to work with young adults that don't know how to act." The last part came out as sort of a joke...though gods knew only sort of.

[Milo Thatch]

Milo was pretty sure if he ever had a kid of his own, he would be the most obnoxious parent, making all the other parents look at his pictures of the kid, telling them what the kid ate for breakfast, when his offspring conjugated their first Latin verb, and so on. Heck, he was already like that with his books and languages, going on and on about stuff nobody else could give half a shake of salt about. It never even occurred to him to be irritated by somebody else's obsession with their child, especially not Alyss, who had always been very nice to him.

He was not expecting his offhanded compliment to have the effect it did, though; she almost seemed distracted for a minute, and her distraction threw him off a little. He snapped back to the moment when she mentioned teaching and he nodded enthusiastically.

"Yeah, yeah. That's the idea, teaching. That's what I was doing back home at the university, and as soon as the portal opened back up, I gave them my letter of resignation and I packed up my stuff and I came here. I guess...I'm starting to realize that was a little impulsive, since no one here has actually hired me yet, but gosh, 'Lyss, after being here, nothing was ever the same, you know? There wasn't a day the past ten years when I didn't think about how I could get back here. This feels like home. Even with everything looking like ten times older than I expected it to."

He grinned, toying with one of the pencils he'd pulled out of the closet a few minutes earlier. "And yeah...like you said, we got a lot of old stodgy professors who don't really know how to relate to kids, and this environment was always so much better than that."

[Alyss Heart]

Her smile returned and broadened as Milo began to explain how he came to return to Tintagel, how excited he was to teach here. "No, I completely get it. I mean, I owe everything to this place, when you think about it. You didn't know me when I first arrived, I...I was in complete denial of who I really was. I actually convinced myself I had made Wonderland up, can you believe it?" She let out a sigh, looking around the staff room. It was a new portion of the place that gave birth to Queen Alyss, but...but it was still a part of it. "I always sort of hoped I could come back, show Tori the place that made...well...her possible, and now I can. As for impulsive, well...sometimes you need that." She couldn't help but think of that one time they skipped...well, her class. He wasn't even part of that one, she didn't think. Events just happened to fall into place just right.

She wasn't given too much time to daydream, and she answered, "Honestly, I was talking more about the leaders I have to talk to...but you're right there. Stodgy professors, murderous professors, professors who clearly didn't seem to give a wit about doing their actual jobs..." She giggled at the memory. "Seriously, I have very little training in this and I still think I'd do a better job than most of our teachers from back then. And you...you might actually be the most qualified professor this school's ever had...just...I think this will work out well for you. For both of us, even."

[Milo Thatch]

Milo had not known Alyss when she first arrived, she was right about that. But he knew all too well what it was like to question your own convictions, to have your own logical mind trying to convince you that the things you'd seen or believed in weren't real.

"My granddad was looking for Atlantis for as long as I can remember," he said, his tone a little distant with nostalgia. "And no one ever believed in him, or it. I even had my doubts, back when I was a silly teenager who thought I had half a chance of being cool. And then we found it, and we were there and everything was so real and then even after that, people still said oh, there's no way that happened, and when everybody around you is telling you that you just made it up or experienced some shared delusion..." He cleared his throat. "It's real easy to start doubting yourself. Even when you have concrete proof." Milo lifted one hand this shoulder, to the tattoo there, mostly concealed beneath his tshirt.

He had thought maybe he was done blushing, but then she went and called him most qualified and that sent another rush of blood into his cheeks. "Oh, applesauce," he said, a little flustered. "I mean, I've done a lot of studying, but I've never ruled a kingdom or anything. You probably have the leadership thing much more figured out than I do."

[Alyss Heart]

Honestly, Alyss had no idea that they had this very specific experience in common, and her jaw dropped a little as he explained everyone doubting Atlantis, including himself...wasn't that a funny coincidence? And the idea of how easy it was to be worn down by everyone around you, absolutely..."Especially when you were just a child..." she murmured. She must have been...twelve, she thought, when she first gave up on Wonderland. Sometimes it struck her and woke her up in a cold sweat in the middle of the night, either the guilt, or just the feeling that Wonderland had been made up and she was about to be torn away from the delusion she had a home and people who understood her and...and her daughter. Those were nights she had to creep into her little girl's room and check that she was indeed real and breathing.

She shook off that dreary train of thought. "Gods, I'd like to think if I had had that sort of thing on me I would've been able to stay strong...but I suppose it's easy to think perhaps your memories were all made up. Or distorted somehow...when ironically, it's other people around you that are encouraging you to distort them in order to fit in...and I didn't even have my Imagination powers for a while there. So I didn't even have that kind of proof against what they had to say." She sighed. "Just...I wasted a lot of time with that mindset...I'm glad I'm passed that."

Milo was clearly very modest, and she admired that about him, but it wouldn't change her mind in regards to him being qualified, so instead of doing so, she shrugged and said, "Perhaps so. I suppose a combination of the two would be ideal in this field...perhaps we can help one another in that regard. You know more about teaching, specifically, and I know more about leadership and working with people who might otherwise be resistant...it just makes sense, to lean on one another, wouldn't you say?"

[Milo Thatch]

Milo was a little envious, if he was honest, that she had gotten to spend the last few years in Wonderland. He reminded himself that it was silly to be jealous of that; she had been working incredibly hard to regain her kingdom and deal with rebuilding her world after an evil dictator, after all. It wasn't as if she'd just been relaxing in Wonderland for years while he'd been hiding away in his basement studying dead languages. He wondered, though, how much different things would be now if he'd gotten sent back to Atlantis instead, if he'd spent the last ten years there. He certainly wouldn't have been studying all the other languages he had, he supposed. He was probably a much more well-rounded scholar for having taken the path he had.

"Yeah, it's...real funny sometimes, thinking about how young I was then, and how much I just...had no idea what was in front of me. Back then my biggest problem was..." What had even been his biggest problem at that age? Probably Apollo and Egeria chasing him around, if he was honest. "Well, we'll see if my biggest problems are even here," he smiled, the memory of that bringing a pink tint back into his cheeks.

He was infinitely grateful for her offer of help. Milo knew how to teach standard university classes, but being back here had brought back the memory of all the antics other students had gotten up to when he'd been in school. "You're absolutely right," he agreed. "Fair warning, I may be leaning on you more than you're leaning on me. I'm way out of practice with the magical students thing, we don't really have any of them back home."

[Alyss Heart]

Alyss nodded, unsurprised that he seemed to understand just how much that sort of pressure affected someone so young...she was however surprised that he seemed to blush at the thought of his "biggest problems" from back then...she imagined she had the same look on her face whenever she thought of...well, the reason she was a mother in the first place.

She tilted her head, unable to resist a mischievous and curious little smile. "Are you thinking of some lost high school sweethearts, Milo?" she teased, although a part of her found their similarities mounting. He was wondering if they were here as well, after all...and she couldn't stop thinking of Hermes. Embarrassing, she knew, especially when he had so many options at home, and it wasn't as if she thought she stood a chance with him. He likely had forgotten her by now. The gods always seemed to take on mortal lovers and forget them. It was easy when you lived forever and your options were literally limitless, after all...why would he remember someone like her? And yet...yet there was that strange sense of belonging and connection she seemed to feel with him the moment they met. Not love at first sight so much as...recognition. Recognition that there was similar pain in them, that perhaps in another world, they'd understand each other perfectly...but again, no need to dwell on that. It was done.

Instead she chuckled at his warning and brushed it off. "Oh please do, I'd be more than happy to help...and you're right, I probably am more practiced with that sort of thing. Imagination powers aren't for everyone, or at least not as strong as they are in my family, but there's a general understanding that magic very much exists there." She shrugged. "But we'll make it work, I'm sure of it..."