social security (took care of this lad)

i'm a poster but i'm not a poster if you get what i mean. and sometimes i just start typing in the discord box and remember that low-effort is my thing

"Haha! Rex, I don't believe it - you were such a cute kid!"

Rex frowns, twinfold. While it's endearing to hear the lilt of such buoyant enthusiasm as he hasn't seen in Shulk perhaps since they'd first met, whenever ago that was, he doesn't always like being reminded of his pre-pubescent days.

Even though this was not those.

"I dunno about kid," he rumbles, sidestepping the easy bait that, well, ain't he still a looker now? "I was 'least twenty-one, there. Least."

And shouldn't Shulk have realized that? Given what else is there to observe.

"Sorry, sorry," Shulk placates, coming down from his fit of almost-giggles. "I suppose I'm just used to how you look now, all scars and stout. You know."

Rex nods. "I do." He can't exactly think of a fluid way to address the other issue.

"And since I only knew you had Mio," Shulk begins, saving his comrade the trouble, "I guess I didn't put two and two together. Or, maybe one and three - three and three?"

Rex laughs, quiet and grateful. "S'alright, kid." Kid? "Math doesn't quite work out no matter how you play it. Sort of what we're used to, now."

After a beat, he continues, "Not exactly the proudest of how I look, there, either. They told me I looked a right copy o' someone s'posed to be my ancestor, which always confused me, because, far as I know, only one of 'em ever saw 'im happy..."

"I'm glad to have had the time to see you all ways, then."

Actually looking at the picture is sort of...meaningless. Everything they were before is meaningless. There's only now. They don't have access to the past, even though they are the past. Because they are the past?

"Oh, Shulk. You ain't seen nothin' yet."