Nai is there when she does, looking...

...perfectly neutral. He doesn't want to figure out what to look like on the outside, facial expressions and body language are fake anyway.

They are absolutely fake, it's true, but she'll smile at him anyway and give him a psychic greeting and affection, to go with his plate. Also instructions about syrup (there is a little bowl of the stuff, on the side of the plate) and its usual use in pancakes.

He doesn't really understand why.

And he doesn't want to face Zash right now. Not before... not after... not now. Not alone. So he gives her a nod and floats away.

Yvette is nonetheless aware that he's glad he was included, and furthermore deeply grateful that he was included in such a way that he could be a massive introvert and not have to interact with anyone. She gives a physical wave, and then heads back into the kitchen to have her own plate of non-experimental red-flavored pancakes.

She will cuddle Zash while she eats.

"So! Do you have pancake flavor preferences now?" she wonders, amused.

"Nope. Preferences are for other people. I'll have everything."

At first there were a couple of bugs cautiously antennaing the flavours, but now they're just dancing around in the mess their plate's become and sharing pieces with each other. Zazi's humanoid body is bouncing back and forth, looking delighted.

"Well, as long as you're willing to be the one to chop the everything. I don't think you'd like a pancake monstrosity of all of the synthfruit flavors, though." She did not end up making a monstrosity, that is left for Zazi to do for themselves. "But some of the combinations are pretty good. My mom likes pink and yellow combined. ... This yellow, not the other, lesser yellow that's more popular in Julai."

"Lesser yellow?"

"Synthfruit was created based on fruit from Old Earth—well, not just fruit, but mostly fruit—uh fruit was a kind of flora-based food—and some fruit shared colours so there are some synths that share a colour or are very similar but taste very differently."

"Right. So there are several flavors of yellow. One of which is, in my opinion, terrible. Though this isn't always true, there's a second purple that's pretty good, actually. I had it once on the sand steamer, and I'm not sure why the purple I know beat that out in December. This is what I meant by humans having impassioned arguments about food, though."

"We should steal more food." Pause. "We have been informed that the Zazie from cities have opinions on this and occasionally eat each other about it."

"...aren't you a city Zazi? Julai is like right over there."

"A little bit. We have an understanding with the Julai us and a bit of blending but we're mostly wasteland Zazi."

Giggle. "So... the Zazie do in fact have dramatic food arguments, it's just this section of you didn't realize it."

"Yes. Do you want me to convey Julai Zazi's feelings about yellow? They might be violent."

"No, thank you. I think it's probably for the best that we have more flavors than less, even if some of them are not to my taste."

"Your loss. Betcha could eat them."

This earns another giggle! "Probably, but that'd be a net loss, with how humans work!"

"They have bad opinions anyway."

“I’ll leave that up to you to collectively sort out, I think I’ve already got my hands full when it comes to convincing others that I’m actually right.”

"No fun."

(Nai likes the brown.)

"If I were maximizing fun instead of other things my actions would look very different," she agrees.

(Would Nai like more of the brown as pancakes? He can also just have the brown synthfruit on its own, he might also like that.)

(He's kind of anxious to talk and trying to give them space but the longer it goes the more scared he gets.)

(Deal with it.)