From: old_hagatha	Date: 10/14/2007 21:48:54

She smiled weakly, "Hello Hamlin. Come in, come in." She said waving her veiny hand, "Come to the kitchen, I will get you something to drink." She was in the middle of cooking and didn't want to leave her dinner unattended.

	From: hamlin_graves	Date: 10/14/2007 21:52:42

He followed her further into the house. "Why thank you," he said warmly as he tread the oddly familiar path into her kitchen. "I do hope I'm not disturbing you."

	From: old_hagatha	Date: 10/14/2007 22:16:46

Agatha, yet again, waved her hand at Hamlin, "Oh hush."

She bustled around the kitchen while he took a seat. She was adding necessary ingredients to the soup she was cooking, her soup that filled the entire house with a hungering aroma. "Now what brings you here?" She said from the stove glancing over her shoulder to him and eyeing him quickly. "You don't look... well."

	From: hamlin_graves	Date: 10/14/2007 22:19:48

He laughed. "It's only because I put this face on," he said, though clearly he was lying. There was a lot in his head, many things he didn't understand. "You always drive straight to the point, don't you?" he asked, not the least bit offended by her straightforwardness.

	From: old_hagatha	Date: 10/14/2007 22:26:20

Agatha laughed to herself, "Strange isn't it?" She asked, "Two people that could afford to waste some time and here I am jumping right to the point." She let out another short chuckle, "I apologize, you know I can't help myself."

	From: hamlin_graves	Date: 10/14/2007 22:32:35

"No need for apologies Agatha," he said congenially, leaning against one of her counters and gazing at her as if he hadn't yet realized how very old she was (and in turn, how very old he should be). "To be perfectly honestly I'm not entirely sure why I'm here. I suppose I am in search of answers, but I don't know which questions to ask. You've always been good at setting my mind at ease."

	From: old_hagatha	Date: 10/14/2007 22:36:59

Agatha smiled hearing those words, "You know Hamlin, I always end up telling you the same old thing." She said before putting a cover over her soup, walking away from the stove, and heading over to Hamlin, "Let me get a better look at you."

	From: hamlin_graves	Date: 10/14/2007 22:45:48

He stood still as she came over and gazed calmly over at her as she looked. He tried to clear his mind of thoughts (particularly regarding Samra) and allow what needed to be known come forth. It was no easy thing, fighting his heart and his mind to let the most important things forward.

	From: old_hagatha	Date: 10/14/2007 22:58:40

Agatha sighed almost instantly, "Why do you concern yourself with matters that you have no control over?"

Hamlin's thoughts were raging, and she could see the crashing waves of his mind, "I said that you didn't look well. It is written all over your face," She forced a smile, "but it is no wonder your appearance is suffering after seeing the way you torture yourself still. I suppose I thought in time you would grow out of such self destruction," She laughed at her own words, "I should've taken into consideration that you don't, in fact, grow."

	From: hamlin_graves	Date: 10/14/2007 23:08:10

Of all the things Hamlin had expected from coming here, certainly not this. He turned away from her apt gaze, her words having stopped him utterly. No one but Agatha could truly knock him down to size and make him realize the things he was too busy ignoring.

He was almost a little hurt by the final comment. He thought he had grown, thought he had learned, yet the oldest prophet was telling him that he had not, that he could not.

"Should I stop trying to make this world a better place?" he asked, all of the little boy hurt shining through his voice, that endless optimism hiding in his words. He truly believed he could make this world a better place. He didn't want to stop interfering; he thought it could make things better.

	From: old_hagatha	Date: 10/14/2007 23:24:18

Agatha took in a deep breath, "Dear friend, don't waste my or your time with questions you already have the answers to." She turned back to her soup, "You don't see things the way you should. You waste so much of your eternal life tricking your mind," She looked to him with a sad expression.

"I apologize, but it's true. You try so hard to convince yourself that good things will happen to you if you do good to it." She turned her back to him yet again, "I know you are smarter than that Hamlin. I know that you are smart enough to realize that the world doesn't work like that." Her old voice was cracking at every word.

Agatha could feel Hamlin's pain but she knew there was no way around what she had to say, whether he wanted to hear it or not.

	From: hamlin_graves	Date: 10/14/2007 23:33:58

"I know," he replied, sounding more like a sullen boy than the adult he was. He found himself very confused and entirely disarmed. He had worked his entire life toward certain goals, had been privileged to know choice things. It was his duty as an immortal, or so he felt, to work behind the scenes and reap the benefits in roundabout ways. "So tell me how I should see things?" he prompted. "I wasn't gifted with sight. If I had been perhaps my choices would not have been so blind."

	From: old_hagatha	Date: 10/14/2007 23:48:37

Agatha cleared her throat, "No matter how hard I try to make this soup perfect," She began, "It's not going to be. The noodles are going to be too soft and no matter how much seasoning I add to it it's still going to taste bland." Agatha could feel Hamlin's confusion on the rise. "What I mean to say is that my gift of sight leaves no room for surprises." Her eyes met with Hamlin's, "You don't want me to tell you your life before you have even the chance to live it."

She was stirring the soup with a large spoon that she soon used to dish out some of the pot's contents into two bowls; two bowls that had been sitting on the counter since before Hamlin's arrival. She gestured a look at Hamlin to take note of this before she carried the two hot bowls over to him.

Smiling faintly, Agatha took a seat across from him, "I apologize, the soup isn't the greatest." She said before even trying it.

	From: hamlin_graves	Date: 10/14/2007 23:53:27

He got the point, pushed past the confusion and sighed. He sat and took the offered soup with a light, tired smile. "It's the gesture that counts," he said, resigned that the only answer he would get from Agatha today would be the life lessons, not so much the real knowledge he sought. "I do wonder if that's why I was not gifted so," he said. "I have only instinct to work from and seeds to sow in soil where I am not certain they will take or grow. Perhaps it makes more of a difference to sow them where they will not yield a crop."

	From: old_hagatha	Date: 10/15/2007 00:01:20

Agatha sipped at her soup and looked to Hamlin with lazy eyes, "Or maybe you should plant your seeds where you do not need to be the one to care for them." She shook her head at him, "Plant your seeds and let them grow on their own, let someone else do the work."

	From: hamlin_graves	Date: 10/15/2007 00:18:49

He eased into the idea and tried the soup. "You're right," he said with a little smile. "It's not the greatest." He sat back and eyed the prophet; she was right of course. Agatha Ambrose's vision had never steered her astray, not to his knowledge. "Though certainly not the worst I've ever had." He didn't comment on her other words, only thinking it might be a nice change of pace to have someone else do the tending in his garden. He ate the soup in quiet contemplation, his mind surprisingly more at ease.