let's play explain trash to the bacterium...

Boop

Boop

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Jo did not understand what they were doing, this game they were playing, even really what challenges were for. But Betsy was nice, helping them, and she seemed to think challenges were a good thing. And they had been told this was a way to make friends, which were also good to have. The regalis had been the one to read out ads, and would probably be more helpful in thinking of something to do than Jo themself would.

They knew where the park was, though. Jo had explored there a few times, and managed to get to the meeting place without stumbling too much. Jo didn't actually notice Jude until Betsy pointed him out. These humans, or non-bacteria creatures, all looked the same.

They wandered over, stopping a little distance away. "He-llo.... You are a person, looking for challen-ges?"​

@Romi
 
Romi

Romi

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Jo was... interesting to look at. By the standards of the narrow reality, they would have been described as strange. By the standards of Manta Carlos? Not that odd at all. They were almost colorless, like someone had taken a straw and drained the pigment right out of them, but the way they spoke and moved was what gave Jude pause.

Gyan, on the other hand, didn't pause at all. He'd come along to officiate the challenge, but there was another man at his side, observing the situation silently and sparing only the occasional glance to Gyan himself.

"Yes," Gyan said. "This is Jude, he's the one doing the challenge. We were going to do trash pickup, if that's alright with the two of you?"
 
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The challenge was right up Betsy's alley, and the fangirl regalia spoke up, "That sounds great!" before Jo even had time to process the words. They were having some difficulty focusing - four other people wasn't exactly overwhelming, but it was enough of a crowd to give the little bacterium some trouble.

From what they were hearing, Jude was in fact doing a challenge, and it was one Betsy agreed to. Possibly. They were mostly sure a compliment was an agreement. Either way, Jo trusted her, so they said yes as well. Then they paused, sorting through their memory to try and decipher what the challenge was. Pick up they thought they knew, but the other thing was uncertain.

"... What is trash?"
 
Romi

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Oh. Well. That was quite a question, wasn't it? Jude was caught momentarily off guard, and then after a moment decided it was probably just a language issue.

"Trash is something discarded. It's garbage, waste, litter... things like that," Jude explained, completely and entirely missing what the actual bit of confusion Jo had was.

"Something like that," he added, pointing to where a plastic bottle lay in the grass near the base of a bush.
 
Boop

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"Dis-card-ed..." Jo thought they knew that word. They weren't exactly sure, but it sounded familiar. They paused some more trying to link it to words they did know. "Waste - ex-tra un-used not wanted."

Betsy nodded enthusiastically, "That's right, Jo! Picking up extra stuff off the ground." She hadn't spent enough time around the bacterium to understand all their quirks either.

When Jude pointed over at something, Jo wasn't quite certain what was going on at first. Was this another weird human gesture for them to interpret? But their regalis helpfully grabbed the bottle and brought it over to give them a closer look.

"Okay. I try to pick up trash. You try to pick up trash. That is chal-lenge?"
 
Romi

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Alright. She was definitely not running at full speed, but it seemed like her Regalis was willing to help her out and... well, babysit.

Some people needed more adjusting than others, Jude reminded himself.

"That's the idea, yeah," Jude said, trying to mentally cut down on larger, more complex words. Better to simplify. Make it neat and easy on poor Betsy.

"Gyan was going to off- run the challenge," Jude said, glancing back to the much older man. "So how about we do me against the two of you?" Which still felt horribly tipped in his favor, didn't it? Like the whole challenge was totally unfair.

"Here," Jude said, pulling a garbage bag to Jo before changing his mind and giving it to Betsy instead. "You can use this. Whoever has a more full bag at the end wins, alright?"
 
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It was a really good thing Jude had brought bags because Jo had heard picking up and assumed it to mean as much as they could carry in their arms. Which would have been awkward and possibly messy, though not likely to bother the little bacterium at all.

Betsy accepted the bag with another bright smile. At least on her part she didn't seem too put off at being Jo's regalis. And Jo though they hadn't gotten the hang of human expressions waved their arms a little and made something resembling a laugh when they put the bottle into the bag.

"I have under-stand. I and Betsy make bag big... Where is end?"
 
Romi

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Okay. Well. Jude was a little bit thrown off, but he could roll with it. They seemed nice, they were interested, and even if Jude still didn't think they got it... well, they didn't really need to get it, did they?

"How about a fifteen minutes?" Jude said. That wasn't a ton of time, but it was enough to get a general idea, and he didn't want to drag it out.

Jude was flying solo, and he snapped on some gloves before he started collecting trash. He wasn't actually putting that much effort in, in part because he was distracted, and in part because he was worried about beating Jo too harshly and upsetting them. He didn't want to beat them that badly.
 
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Time, time was something definitely had more trouble understanding than anything else. But minutes and such had been drilled into them, at least as an abstract concept, before they'd left the space station. Telling the time just was not important alone on a space rock.

Still they knew how to deal with this. Digging into a pocket, Jo pulled out the phone they'd been given and passed it to Betsy. "Phone has clock for show-ing minutes." "Okay. Guess I'll keep track of time then." The regalis smiled at both of them.

Jo didn't put on gloves as they started looking over the ground for things to pick up. Looking through a sea of gray didn't help much, but finding things that didn't belong was easier in grass than people's faces. Then again, the first thing they picked up was a large twig. Then a rock. Betsy was still smiling, but sort of at a loss to explain why those things didn't count.
 
Romi

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Jude had come into the whole challenge with a general game plan, but that entire plan had been effectively shoved out the window. He really, really didn't want to beat them so badly they felt bad. Really, a part of him was considering how he could potentially confer with Jo's Regalia to find out if he should just let them win for having tried hard.

Because they did seem to be trying hard. Even at a distance Jude could tell that much, but he was also pretty sure they'd just put a rock in their bag.

So, in the midst of colleging his own trash (which was, you know, actually trash and not rocks or sticks or anything), Jude attempted to catch Betsy's attention, and then mouthed Should I let her win? as clearly as possible.
 
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