It certainly wasn't in young Edgar's current scope to understand why someone might not want to see. Wouldn't she have trouble moving around? Was she missing out on the beauty of the waterfall not far away? But, he supposed, if she was content and she saw no issue with it, then he would leave it be. And...she was right. Just because she couldn't swim and he couldn't walk didn't mean they were broken or wrong...right? That was what made him wonder if he'd offended her.

He nodded, head breaching the water again. "Yes, that makes sense. I didn't mean to imply that, I'm sorry." He would have to remember that in the future.

Edgar listened, taking his first lessons well and nodding along with Aurelle's response. It didn't totally make sense to him - if he was in trouble he would want help. If he had tried to bite her when she picked him up, would she have stopped trying to save him, even though it was an emergency? He doubted it, though, she was nice and caring and wouldn't sit by and watch him die. "Oh, okay. Are some people mean just to be mean?" While his face was not one to emote strongly, something like concern passed through his eyes. "Or is it only hurt people that are mean? Or being hurt makes some people mean even if they're aren't usually?" Although...he didn't really understand yet what being mean really was. He had yet to encounter it.

He was lost, quickly, in wonder at the description of the many many caves. His eyes gleamed with wonder imagining other places as big as this place - and so many that Aurelle was pointing out. "Wow, there's many caves! I want to see the spooky but warm place and the buzzy place. Is there a place with lots and lots of water? I mean..." He looked around at the many pools and lagoon they were in. "A different water-place. Wait...can I even get to other places, if I can't walk?" A sudden fear overtook him. If he couldn't walk, would he be stuck here? Forever and ever?

That wasn't a terrible thing, this cave was nice and all and Aurelle was here, but he wanted to go farther then just this one place. He wanted to see why Eridanus was spooky and feel the humidity of Cetus and maybe even see Aurelle's home! But if he couldn't....oh, oh that would be very sad indeed.

@Aurelle

"That's okay, no need to apologize," Aurelle said, smiling. She meant it, too-- it was fine. What was she going to do, start yelling at a child who almost died two minutes ago?

She hummed for a moment, considering his questions instead of answering right off the bat. She was fairly certain no one was just mean for the sake of it, though. She'd certainly never met anyone like that. "I think getting hurt makes some people mean, yes," Aurelle answered. "No one wants to be mean, not really. People who are usually very nice might get hurt by people they like and take it out on others, for example. It's a... defense mechanism, I suppose."

"Think about it like this: if someone very close to you hurt your feelings, you might never let anyone close to you again. That way you can't be hurt like that again. I'm sure not every case of someone being mean is like that, but I think it's a good indicator that something is wrong, and they might need some help," the elf went on. "I think it's an important thing to remember. Hurting other people just spreads more hurt people, you know?"

At Edgar's next question, she tapped her chin gently. "Well, ahh, I'm not sure if I can answer that, Edgar," she said, honestly. "I don't go into water unless I have to drink or bathe. But... all water has to come from somewhere, and then go somewhere else, or else all the caves would be flooded, wouldn't they? Perhaps there's ways to get to different rooms that I don't know about."

It's not like she'd be able to see them if they were obvious.

"Why don't you have a little swim around?" She suggested, good-naturedly. "See if you can find any little tunnels or passageways. I can wait here and hear about them once you come back."

@Edgar

What a terrible thought, that someone could trust someone and they could hurt them. If you liked someone, weren't you supposed to be nice to them? Like how Aurelle was nice to him now? He looked at her for a long moment, his head lifted above the water, and asked, "You won't hurt my feelings, though, right? That sounds like something mean people do." And obviously Aurelle wasn't mean. She would never do that to him. But then why does it happen at all? Maybe that was just something he'd have to learn. He wasn't sure if he wanted to.

But...he supposed if he was hurt like that, he didn't think he'd want to swear of people. He wouldn't not ask for help. It was a naive thought, of course, but he was absolutely sure and certain that he would never be mean on purpose, unless someone was trying to hurt him. Maybe not even then. If only to defend himself, maybe, but never to reject help. It was just a strange idea for Edgar right now.

"I don't...really get it but I haven't met anyone mean yet. So I wouldn't know. Have you? Met anyone mean?" He hoped she didn't. He didn't think she deserved to meet mean people.

As for underwater tunnels, that made him a little excited. All the fear of the moment dashed away at the prospect and he nodded so fiercely (forgetting for the moment that she couldn't see it) that he splashed a bit of the water. "Oh, oh yes good idea! I'll be right back!"

Edgar turned and dove forward, pushing forward and finding, with surprise, how quickly he shot through the water. It was his first proper swim and he was shocked at how easy it was to glide through the water and cut through the, albeit quite gentle, currents. There were other fish around, none so big as him, and all scattering as soon as he got close. Lessers, then? They didn't speak and didn't ask for help, so must be Lessers.

He swam around for only a few minutes before he felt the current tug at him. He followed its directions and saw, below the water, and opening in the rocks, where the current was pulling him towards. Excited, he turned and raced back towards the surface, although he forgot exactly where Aurelle had been standing. It wasn't until he poked his head out of the water that he saw her standing on the beach and quickly returned to her.

He thrust his head of the water, spraying a bit again on accident, in his excitement to tell her what he'd seen. "There is a tunnel! The current was pulling there. Where do you think it goes? Spooky place? Buzzy place? Somewhere else?"

@Aurelle

Aurelle considered this, too, very seriously. "I might," she said, honestly. "But if I did, it wouldn't be intentional, I think. If I ever say something that hurts your feelings, you should tell me so that I can say sorry and learn how to talk better." That seemed fair. It's what Aurelle would want someone else to do, if they accidentally hurt her feelings.

Her finger traced her bottom lip thoughtfully. "I've met some people who were unkind, yes," she said. "There was someone who started calling me names, once, when I was young, and I cried for a while. And when I was older, I realized I should have just left instead of standing there, letting them do it. So now, if someone is unkind and doesn't want help, I just leave them alone. I want to spend my time with people who are nice, after all."

When Edgar left to look around, she said, "good luck!" And, of course, she waited. When a few minutes passed, she trudged to the shallower waters to sit down-- but it wasn't like she'd gone very far, or even was very difficult to spot, even for a shark.

Sitting in the lapping water was much nicer than standing there, too. She felt a little less indecent with her dress under control, too.

Aurelle was just kind of relaxing peacefully when Edgar sprayed her with water. She blinked, her ears perking up almost stark upright on her head. "Oh! A tunnel, yes, there's lots of those on land, and they go everywhere. I'm not so certain where it might go, but.." she hummed.

"Well, water is in most places. So, ahh, I think you should be able to go just about everywhere if you can find the right tunnel. There's lots and lots of places and lots of people to meet," she said. "You might meet mostly people who are under the water, or you might meet people who are coming for some water like me."

"Oh! Are you hungry?" She asked half-out-of-the-blue. "Hungry kind of feels like a tummyache. We can try and find some food that you like."

@Edgar

He was very excited about the tunnel he'd found, and the prospect of being able to explore more. He briefly got so excited as Aurelle was talking that he turned and did a quick, zooming lap around in a circle before stopping back in front of her. And then he got serious again because he remembered she'd talked about mean people. And that just didn't sit right with him, that people could be mean at all.

"Sorry that someone was mean. You don't deserve that. I also want to spend time with nice people." Spending time with mean people didn't sound very fun, nor very productive, especially when he had no intention of being mean back.

Or maybe he would. Eh, who knows, he was still young and there was a world of experience to be had.

"I'll go and explore them all and I'll tell you all about the underwater tunnels. Where they go and stuff. And I'll make friends and introduce you! Since you don't know any other swimming creatures. Only if they're nice." Yes, yes he had no intention of bringing back anyone to Aurelle that would call her names or be mean or dangerous. He probably wouldn't associate with them at all.

As for hunger, he thought about it for a minute. Was he hungry? He had never eaten in his life, and he'd already done a lot of high-stress activity (almost dying) and had swum around a bunch. Thinking about it now, there was something like a tummyache, like something inside was tightening. "Oh. Yeah I think I am hungry. What do you eat?"

@Aurelle

Aurelle nodded thoughtfully. "I can come here more often for water so you can find me, then I can meet all the friends you make. Maybe one day I'll bring my friend, Lichen along, too, and you can meet her." Lichen wasn't exactly the most sociable, but it was always good to get her out and meeting people.

She tapped her chin, thinking. "I eat just about everything," she said. "Berries, mushrooms, meat. You can usually tell what someone eats by their teeth-- people who only eat plants have really dull teeth, and people who only eat meet have really sharp teeth. What kind of teeth do you have?" (It wasn't like she could just look down and see).

"Depending on what you eat, we can try and get you some food," the elf offered. It'd be easiest if Edgar liked berries and the like; fruit was always fairly easy to find when the caves were warm. If it were meat, Aurelle wasn't so sure she could catch something for him. Lichen usually did that work for her.

But, you know, she'd try.

@Edgar

Um, what kind of teeth did he have? That wasn't something he'd really thought about, nor could he really check. He certainly tried, turning to the side a bit so he could try and look down easier, but his own mouth was a little bit out of his field of view. He mashed his jaw around a bit, but that didn't really help either, he just felt water getting pushed out of his mouth and his teeth closing.

Okay. That was fine.

He looked back up at Aurelle. "Um, I don't know, can you tell me? Here, I'll..." And with hesitation and a bit of effort, he managed to roll himself over so that he was floating on his back and opened his mouth to show off his teeth. Unbalanced as he was and feeling a bit dizzy, he quickly righted himself, blinking the faint out of his eyes.

@Aurelle

"Oh, well I can't--" Aurelle began, but she heard the dim splashing of Edgar rolling over. She had two choices: a quick spellcast, or jamming her fingers into Edgar's mouth before flipped back over. One of those was a lot less invasive than the other.

It wasn't the strongest cast she'd ever done; she didn't have a huge amount of time or focus like she usually did, but it sure did the job fine. She could sense the Edgar-shaped mass in front of her based on how many bacterium was swarming all over him (and water was very, very loaded with microbial life), and, dimly, his open mouth.

Mouths were always one of the clearest things she could sense with this spell. Mouths were... particularly gross, and one in a list of many that Aurelle tried not to think about too much. She could make out, just about, rows and rows of teeth in Edgar's mouth before he flipped back over.

Interesting. What did he need all those for?

"I think they're sharp," Aurelle said eventually, her head finally turning to face Edgar properly, instead of blindly staring in his approximate direction. Until he moved slightly and she had to go back to tracking him based on his voice and noises. "So, you probably eat meat. Ahh... you'll have to learn to hunt."

The elf tapped her chin. "I don't really do the hunting," she admitted. "But, my partner says that she just waits for things to come near her nose. Though, ahh, she can't see either." Ahh... I'm being very unhelpful, she fretted briefly.

"Are you very fast?" She asked. "Maybe you could, ahh, just bolt after another fish and grab it. Make sure it's smaller than you, though."

@Edgar

It hadn't occurred to him that Aurelle couldn't actually see his teeth. But...well, she'd answered anyways. He continued to completely forget the entire "being blind" thing.

He nodded a bit, remembering that he'd seen some fish swimming around during his initial investigation of the lagoon. He peeked out of the water again. "Okay. I can try that I think."

And back into the water he went, turning and swimming off a bit in the direction he'd went before. What did Aurelle say to do? Wait for something? No, that was someone that couldn't see. No, no it was bolt after a fish. Right. He looked right and left until he saw a small school of fish swimming not far away and, without hesitating, bolted at them as fast as he could go.

He surprised himself with his speed, rocketing through the water towards the fish, which scattered as soon as he got close. But they were not fast enough as he zoomed right through them with his mouth open, snagging one so directly that it almost just went straight down his throat.

He stopped his swim, trying not to choke as he bit down on the fish to at least try to get a reasonable chunk out of it, but then realized it was just easier to swallow it whole - which he did.

Edgar floated in the water for a moment, kind of going over that moment in his head for a second, before turning back to Aurelle and returning to the beach. It had probably been about 5 minutes that he was gone.

He arrived back, not as gung-ho as he'd been previously, peeking out of the water. "Hey - I did it! Caught a fish and everything. It was pretty good. I can swim really fast!" He felt pretty dang proud of himself for that!

@Aurelle

Usually, when someone hunted, she could hear them walking off. It took her a moment to realize that Edgar had already went, however, her mind not quite catching up despite his words and the little splash of his head sinking back beneath the water (which, in fairness, she'd gotten quite used to by now).

She supposed, after a moment, she'd never exactly heard anything move beneath the water. Things splashing on the surface didn't count. When Edgar returned some five minutes later, he found the elf curiously touching the surface of the water and sinking her hand in, testing where the limit was meant to be between what she could hear and what she couldn't.

"Oh!" she said, head turning back to Edgar's general direction. "Good job! Was the fish good?" She wasn't much of a fan, personally. Too many scales, and even when the tavern offered fish unscaled and unboned, she still occasionally found one in there. It was unpleasant, to say the least.

But, as long as Edgar enjoyed it. "Different kinds of fish will taste different," she offered wisely. "So, if there's a fish you don't quite like, you could try another. Maybe I'll bring some land-meat over for you to try another day, too." She wondered if he'd prefer them raw or cooked-- but as far as she knew, there wasn't much way to cook underwater.

Actually... "are you cold?" She asked curiously. "Or do you feel normal?" She got cold when she got out of water, but maybe fish didn't feel that way considering they... well, never got out of water.

@Edgar