Having Enhanced Hearing meant Baskar heard things he either didn’t want to hear, or things he shouldn’t hear. He felt like if he was prone to gossiping, this power would definitely be dangerous for him. Luckily, he was more often trying to refocus whenever he heard things that weren't meant for him: aka everything. Focussing on the sound of fridges, cooking sounds, waves, birds, animals, the wind. Really anything. But language was so hard to tune out. Even if he didn’t mean to do it, he’d refocus on a sentence. As if he was in a bar and he suddenly heard Bahasa Indonesian. Even if he didn’t want to listen in on anyone, it pulled him in. 

And as a result, Baskar usually walked through the area where most people were - with his headphones on - blushing. 

Sometimes however, despite how they didn’t want to, they picked up things that were useful. They picked up plans or suggestions or comments. They picked up talk about Lindi’s future town hall project, and decided they could make food for it. They picked up when people needed things that they were telling the wrong person. They could make themself even more liked by showing up with what people needed, at least if they were able to grant it. 

In this case: they felt like they could grant it. Or at least they could help enough. 

Baskar appeared near the stranger with a smile on their face, not even overthinking what they were going to say to explain why they showed up out of nowhere, and how they’d managed to pick this up from at least two hundred metres away. 

As the day wore on, and people filed in and out of the place - mostly for surface level injuries, the ones that took a bandage or some painkiller ( he had a thought about the word painkiller at some point - Adarsh spend it trying to guess which of the island's residents would fall over first with the possiblity of food scarcety. Of course he also considered his own situation, but he'd learned through Darcy that he was capable of fishing, so he didn't think he'd go hungry any time soon. The food would just be more bland.

He also thought he was friendly with Zaid. That should count for something.

it was easy to judge the majority of the island residents, as he had only few friends, some enemies, and disliked most people on principle. Don't ask him what principle.

Perhaps he judged them for how often they came in, for what injuries... yes, yes he did.

The high heel lady: definitely was going to have a mental breakdown the first week after the food stopped reappearing.

The guy with the fire earrings: actually maybe he'd make it pretty far, he'd just complain all the way through.

The storm bringer...

Adarsh frowned. "What's the matter?" he asked, as he studied Lokni top to bottom. Good thing nobody could read his thoughts, because he did think Lokni and Tej would outlast him.

Adarsh had woken up after the horrors of the first day with the quick realisation that he was still in the same shit. A blank page in some kind of experiment. Surrounded by people who mostly did not seem to understand that he was getting increasingly frustrated.

He hadn’t even dreamt. He’d tried to go to sleep with the memories of the day, but he’d woken up empty. 

Groggy and annoyed he had discarded his shoes - they were dirty, smelly, and too hot. And after his first interaction that day, he also had changed out of his tank top and found a replacement in the warehouse from some American basketball team. 

His nose hurt from the first violent interaction of that day, and he hated how it hadn’t gotten rid of the itch he felt. He was still looking for a fight.

While trying to find a way to get rid of that sensation.