Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click. Click.

There was something tickling at the back of Elijah's mind. He tried to ignore it, not wanting to leave the warm haze of sleep, but the sounds were persistent. Reluctantly, he opened his eyes, trying to blink the blurriness away. After a few minutes he sat up and scratched at one shoulder; he hated falling asleep in his clothes.

Then he took in the state of the room.

In the corner, his suitcases lolled against the wall, empty. The former contents of said suitcases were now strewn from one end of the room to the other. A pair of his jeans hung from a set of monkey-bars, and his underwear was now decorating a lamp.

In the centre of the mess sat a boy, intently fixed upon something within the palm of his hand. Click. Click. Click.

"Hey!"

The boy's head snapped up, expression guilty.

Elijah crawled to the end of the bed. "That's my stuff! What are you doing with it!?"

The boy held out his hand, revealing a small, square object; Elijah recognised it as his MD player. The boy pressed the on button and the LCD display lit up with a brilliant turquoise light and he smiled in delight. When he pressed the button again, the display went dark again.

"Yes, on, off, congratulations, you've mastered binary." Elijah said sarcastically. "Now if you don't mind, I'd like to know why you've been going through my stuff?"

The boy waved the MD player at him and clicked it on again.

Elijah frowned and held out his hand. The boy passed it back to him, reluctance obvious.

Elijah turned it off again and sighed. "Ok, I'll assume that you're not trying to steal my stuff, although it's possible you're just a thief with the attention span of a goldfish." He waved the small square object for effect. "This is my MD player. These are my clothes, disks, books, toiletries and other personal effects. I don't suppose you'd like to tell me what they're doing all over the floor?"

The boy blinked at him.

Elijah sighed again. "I suppose I should consider myself lucky that Connor didn't let me bring the laptop," he muttered to himself.

The boy in the middle of the mess looked a couple of years younger than Elijah, fifteen or sixteen at most. He had a shock of thick hair that hung to his shoulders, deep red streaked through with black. His eyes were wide and a sparkling kind of blue that suggested mischievousness. Elijah suspected that this meant that his stay here would be even more hellish than he had anticipated. He rubbed at his temples and tried to let go of his irritation.

"Ok, we're obviously off to a bad start here. Let's begin again. I'm Elijah."

The boy blinked at him.

Elijah stared back at him, and counted slowly to twenty in his head. There was still no response.

"Are you deaf, mute or just stupid?"

The boy blinked again.

Elijah tried to remember whether he'd packed any asprin. He decided to make one last attempt.

"You're Kiseki, right? My room-mate?"

The boy's face lit up and he nodded.

"Well, that rules out deaf then," Elijah muttered. "Please tell me I'm not on babysitting duty for an imbecile."

Kiseki ignored him and picked up a disk, holding it above his head so that he could see through the corners of the square of translucent orange plastic.

Elijah held out his hand again and Kiseki handed it over with a sulky expression. Elijah arched an eyebrow. Kiseki added the three disks he had secreted into his other hand to the pile.

"Thankyou. Now, seeing as you've already helped me unpack," Elijah said, somewhat caustically, "perhaps you could assist me in putting away my things?"

Kiseki nodded, subdued.

Elijah established several different piles upon the bed, and set Kiseki to fetching items and sorting them out. Elijah re-folded his clothes as Kiseki returned them, trying to smooth out the wrinkles.

At one point, Kiseki picked up an odd L-shaped piece of plastic with a strap attached at one end. Kiseki peered at it, turning it over, obviously perplexed as to its use. He put one end in his mouth and bit down on it, finding it solid and unyielding.

"Hey! Don't chew on that!"

Kiseki removed it from his mouth, tilting his head questioningly.

"It's an orthotic." At Kiseki's blank stare, Elijah added pointedly: "Not edible."

Kiseki took hold of the leather strap and dangled the plastic from it, giving it a push to make it swing back and forth and then looking back at Elijah hopefully.

Elijah almost smiled in return, before remembering that the kid was the pest that had thrown his things around in the first place. "No, no. It goes in your shoe."

The boy looked down at his own bare feet and wiggled his toes.

"Give it here; I'll show you."

Kiseki passed it to him. Elijah pulled one sneaker off, settled the orthotic inside it, flat along the sole, and then slipped his foot back in. The plastic curved up at his heel and followed the back of his leg to mid-calf. At the top, Elijah velcroed the strap around his shin and then pulled his jeans down over the top of it.

"See?"

Kiseki nodded in delight. He ferreted around the piles of clothing and oddments until he found the matching orthotic. He hesitated, looking to Elijah for permission.

Elijah waved a hand at him. "Knock yourself out."

Kiseki set his heel into the hollow and strapped the leather around his shin. Carefully, he stood up, testing his weight. The orthotic gave slightly, melding itself to the shape of his foot. He took a step, and then another, looking up to grin at Elijah. He looked like a marionette, unused to walking with one ankle locked in place.

Elijah sat back and watched him wobbling around. This was going to be a very long week.