I was wondering which tampons/pads are your faves. I mean, clearly not all lady bits are the same and not everyone can stand just any material they're made of, right?
For example, before I took it to the next level with my trusty o.b.'s, I used to use mainly always, because that's what my mother was using and because you can find them literally everywhere. I despise them. I can't breathe in them. They suck, imho. The only ones that were manageable were the sensitive ones, but then they all turned even more plasticky and that's a no go for me. People, your skin needs to be able to freaking breathe, not get all sweaty and musty, periods are unpleasant enough. Anyway, later, a friend lent me a couple of hers, since I was in desperate need. Ever since then, they're my favourite pads. If anyone is interested, I'm talking about bella perfecta...and yes, they're that good. But ever since I moved to Germany, I have a hard time buying them, since the only store that sells them is so damn far away and we don't really go shopping there that often (Kaufland, for those interested). So I had to find alternatives. And I did, after a loooong looong search and many trials and errors. Although they're not like bella perfecta, they're still pretty good. Sophie is one of the brands, and you can find it usually at netto marken-discount (I think this might be german only) and the other one is Jessa sold by all dm stores....which is found only in Europe, I guess? No idea, really. However, I'm pretty sure you can find them on Amazon or whatever. Oh, and another one sold by rossmann, and this is the one I mainly use, called facelle (also Germany/Europe only?).
As for tampons, well...I'm super content with o.b. so I figured there's no point in trying others. But everyone has their preferences, so no judging here.
So, enough rambling and...well, you could call it advertising? Although I gain nothing from this, most definitely don't even want to, I just wanted to share this bit of info based on my personal experiences.
The meeting between Baba and a few of the more liberal Namekian elders was scheduled for the evening. In the end, Baba had to call ahead to the compound and explain that there would be an addition to their party. Morgan packed a lunch box to tide Choi over until a late dinner, and by the cover of twilight they arrived at the Namekian compound’s front building.
Outside, it looked fairly normal--a fat dome that was popularized by Capsule Corp for quick, easy construction. There was no writing or signage. Inside, though, the hanging silks in various traditional Namekian patterns made it clear that the witches and Choi had come to the right location. Amongst the draped robes and vests in bright colors, the witches’ dark clothing stood out more than it usually did. They felt a number of stares fall on them. But, those quickly left. Feet shuffled. Most of the Namekians inside suddenly found that they were needed elsewhere, very promptly.
Choi began sweating, fiddling with his hands and the few scabs that remained there. He bit his lip, watching the young witches and Baba for their reactions.
All four had relaxed postures. Now inside the building and away from the prying eyes of the general public, Baba began to float in the air once more instead of walking. Morgan cleaned the lenses of her glasses with a handkerchief with owls embroidered in one corner.
A pair of tall, broad-shouldered Namekians with grim expressions walked through a doorway. They then escorted the visitors from the front door into a room with a handful of tables surrounded by chairs. Both looked Choi up and down, eyes narrowing. But, when they watched the Saiyan attempt to shrink and hide behind Morgan, they both paused. That was a new one. Maima and Tsumuri exchanged glances, and it was apparent to both that neither knew exactly how to react. Better just not even think about it. These outsiders were strange, even by outsider standards.Then the two Namekians left through the curtained doorway, presumably to fetch their elders.
Ceredwen slumped into one of the chairs and oozed half-way down it.
“I wish we could have taken brooms,” Ceredwen sighed.
“We’d definitely get spotted, even after dark,” Morgan replied.
“Yeah. Man, I hope that our district gets expanded at some point. Baba, may we go somewhere where we can fly after the school year is over?” The pale girl asked.
Baba threw a withering glare at the blond, but settled into a chair. Her ever-present crystal ball seemed to appear on the table as the elder witch removed a glamour from it.
“Ask me after the graduation showcase. I’m not taking you anywhere if you slack off in your last year,” Baba said.
Morgan heaved a heavy basket onto the table before sitting down.
“Can we go to the ocean?” Morgan asked.
“I don’t know. Can you improve your botany skills?” Baba shot back at the bespectacled girl.
Morgan winced and sunk into another chair. Choi followed suit next to Morgan.
The curtain moved again, and all members of Baba’s household turned their heads to look. Four Namekians entered. The first was tall, wrinkled, and a dark olive-green with age. The second was shorter and plumper, also an olive-green. But, he had an easy smile. The third was tall, and young. He had an uneasy frown across his face, and stood in front of the fourth like a guard. The fourth was barely over five feet tall, and wore similar robes to the first.
“Oh! Thanks for your help the other day!” Aradia said after spotting Inca.
Inca’s eyes narrowed and a small bead of sweat formed on the back of his neck. They recognized him? So much for the assumption that they wouldn’t be able to tell him from any other Namekian. Shit. Maybe he shouldn’t have agreed to this.
Kami smiled, moving forward to sit at the table opposite of Baba.
“Thank you for coming all this way. It is a pleasure to finally meet you face to face, Baba,” Kami said.
“This is elder Moori. You’ve already met Inca, and this is Dende,” Kami continued.
“These are my apprentices, Ceredwen, Aradia, and Morgan. And this is Choi. Due to some unusual circumstances, he’s staying with us,” Baba said.
Each of the young witches stood and curtseyed. Choi stood up so fast that he knocked the chair he was sitting in backwards. With a luminous blush that reached his ears, Choi scrambled to right the chair before sinking back into it and looking at the ground.
“My, what a well-mannered group of young people,” Moori laughed.
“Dende, why don’t you and Inca get to know these other young people better?” Kami suggested.
“A fine idea,” Baba agreed, staring at each of the young witches in turn.
“Of course,” the smallest Namekian said.
Oh. So they were all banished to the kiddie table, were they? Aradia shrugged, getting out of her seat. Morgan and Ceredwen followed suit, along with Choi. The younger members of Baba’s household followed Dende and Inca into a connected room that matched the first. Again, they all fell into a loose circle around a table.
Dende was the first to break the silence.
“Elder Kami said you call yourselves...witches?” the smallest Namekian asked.
“It’s what we are,” Ceredwen said, then turned to Morgan and Aradia.
“I’m taking this stupid thing off. We aren’t really in ‘public’,” the blond said.
Ceredwen slid her thumbs underneath the bandage across her eyes and pulled it off, over her head. Maybe she knew, somehow, that Dende was skeptical. In a way, Inca was, too. After all, there had to be some way he had just...dreamed all of that nonsense from earlier up. It couldn’t be real. That sort of thing wasn’t possible. But, the pale blond put the first round of skepticism to rest without saying anything more. Her eyes were framed by thick, blond lashes.
Her eyes were dark. Dark. Deep. There were no white sclera, not even a strange color to the irus. From corner to corner, Ceredwen’s eyes were an inky black, speckled with pale and shining flecks. It was like looking into the night sky on planet Namek--without any of the light pollution to block out the starlight.
Inca opened his mouth to say something, but couldn’t manage to force any noise out.
“Feeling better?” Morgan asked.
“Much,” Ceredwen said.
Dende turned to Inca, who made a similar expression of confusion back.
“You...aren’t human,” Dende finally said.
If he was being honest, Dende had just assumed that these people were a cultural minority. They looked human. They seemed human. But, he’d never seen anything like that. Suddenly, Inca’s nervousness about these people made sense. Dende had asked. But, Inca had just said he must have imagined it--whatever it was that he saw. In the end, the older Namekian had never actually told him what he’d seen.
“We can pass pretty well as human, right? Or at at least the three of us can. Some of the others can’t,” Morgan said.
“You really can,” Dende echoed, lacing his fingers together as he placed his hands on the table.
Out of the corner of his eye, Dende could see Choi start to investigate the contents of the basket Morgan brought with her. But, his interest was far from the quiet Saiyan for the moment. Dende wondered about asking a question and then decided against it. Better to be polite.
“Our kind breeds with humans regularly, so it’s to be expected. The witch who bore me couldn’t pass, but my sire was an out-cross--a normal human,” Morgan supplied the answer to Dende’s unvoiced question, and a little more personal information than Dende wanted to hear.
Creepy.
Dende learned was that, like the Namekians, the witches usually kept to their own. It was only within the past generation that the elders had started making an effort at any sort of integration with the rest of Earth’s population. Still, the witches had their own schools. They had their own gated districts that even government employees were primarily banned from without explicit invitation. Apparently their existence was something of a well-kept secret within the higher-ups of the government, and several private banks.
Still, Dende found himself remaining a tiny bit skeptical. Inca tried to pretend to be, but couldn’t quite lie to himself to that degree.
But, the young witches seemed happy to oblige a few demonstrations of their differences from humans. Morgan sent a strawberry from Choi’s packed ‘snack’ gently spinning through the air, around the table, and then back into the basket with its brethren with nothing more than a point of her index finger.
Then, like Inca, Dende seemed to sit back under the weight of this new information. So, then, why were they making contact with the Namekian community?
“Don’t ask us. That’s up to the elders. But, they’ve been around for a while, so I guess that they’ve got a good reason rather than suddenly deciding to get more social,” Aradia replied.
Morgan shrugged.
Baba was at least well passed four hundred. Neither of the young witches in that building knew her exact age. Usually they got chased around the house and yelled at if they asked. But, as a race the witches had watched the rise and fall of countless human civilizations. And now that other races from the stars were settling on Earth, a lot was changing. Or rather it was just the point in the cycle that witches needed to watch, again. Humans did everything in cycles.
Nevertheless, the young witches had faith. And so, they listened to their elders.
“Anyway, if you want to reach us, it should be easy. We don’t have phones, but Baba’s been talking about us getting something like that. Let us know if you have any problems,” Aradia said.
By this point, Inca had stopped giving all of his attention to the conversation between the young witches and Dende. There was something weird about that man that the witches brought with them. Choi, hadn’t the small, old woman said? Inca was positive the guy was a Saiyan. He was covered in fighting scars and had the tail. Hell, he had more scar tissue on him than Piccolo Senior had when he was still alive. Choi was also nearly as tall as Inca--one of the few Warrior class Namekians in the compound. Inca probably only had a few inches on him in height.
So why was this guy, covered in scars and coiled muscle, trying his best to hide in Morgan’s shadow? If he was supposed to be a guard or a warrior, he was doing an awful job at even pretending. If anything, it seemed more like he was relying on Morgan for protection. He kept glancing back at the bespectacled witch, as if worried that she would leave. Choi was also strangely quiet and his shrinking body language screamed ‘self-esteem problems’. This wasn’t a fighter. Probably, even Inca had more fighting experience or expertise. Something wasn’t right.
Inca had to find out.
Maybe it was his nature. Nail always said he over-thought everything, and that he hated missing information because, like Nail, he was a warrior. It was in their core to notice when something was off. Maima and Tsumuri also said that Choi was weird. So it wasn’t just Inca over-analyzing what was going on.
Still. Somehow Choi seemed like the least threatening outsider in that entire room. Maybe Choi didn’t catch it. But, when the witch with the glasses caught him looking at her like she was his foundation, she looked-- It was the same look that Guru or Kami had in their eyes when they remembered Piccolo Senior and thought no one could tell. Like, maybe they could have done something, anything, for a different ending. They were kind. Inca knew they always hoped that both Piccolo Senior and Junior could have found more happiness and peace--even if they felt at a loss for how to provide that. So what was a kid like Morgan doing with an expression like that?
She was a kid, right? All of the witches wore school uniforms, so they were probably minors. Morgan and Choi. They had a weird relationship. Inca knew that for sure. And maybe it was nosy of him, like Nail said. But, Inca wanted answers. At least that was a better way of acting on his instincts than punching people in the face. It was probably even a smiled-upon thing, considering how violent the previous generation of warriors was.
Inca was so deep in his own thoughts that he almost missed the end of the meeting. The witch elder with the pink hair shouted for the younger ones, and they gave a polite good-night before leaving. By the time they left, Choi had worked his way through a picnic basket that would have probably fed three adult humans. Then they were gone, as quickly as they had arrived.
Somehow, though, when Inca watched Elder Moori and Elder Kami come back into the room all smiles and laughs, he doubted that the witches would really, ever leave. The old woman with the pink hair. The pale blond with eyes like the night sky. The tall one with hair like a puff of dark dandelion seeds. The meekest Saiyan alive. And, especially, the smallest one with dark hair and glasses that had driven a half-dozen teenagers away from his shop. Inca got the feeling that they would never really disappear from the compound, somehow. In some tiny way, they’d always be there.
But, that was absurd.
Ridiculous.
They didn’t strike Inca as bad people. But, they were definitely people who caused change. That might be worse.
