Otto sauntered in to dinner a bit late, and therefore didn't have a spot at the heart of the Vitus table like he usually did. Rather than go and ask them to make room, however, he merely sat on one end of the table by himself, calmly and contentedly filling his plate with food and smiling to himself at the snatches of conversation he happened to overhear from his classmates. He loved each and every one of his friends, but some days it was more relaxing to be on the outside looking in, eavesdropping and people-watching like the foreign spy everyone joked about him being. He watched a few conversations with passing interest, including some sort of altercation between Helen's friend Clio and an incredibly large zombie boy, but quickly became bored from not talking to anyone for almost ten full minutes and started trying to catch Helen's eye in order to plea for conversation.

To say the least, Helen was surprised that Otto was still in the hall. As she wondered vaguely why she hadn't noticed him before (and why Clio had told her Otto was elsewhere) she happily glided over to her friend. "Otto~ I didn't see you, why didn't you come over and bug me?" She ignored the issues between Clio and Finn as she grinned brightly at Otto.

Otto gave Helen one of his big grins and shrugged. "I thought I'd try doing the quiet relaxing meal thing," he explained, his smile turning pained. "It's not working so great, haha." He gestured for her to sit with him. "So what's up?"

"Aw." Helen offered her friend a sympathetic look as she slid onto the bench beside him. "I dunno I was just kinda zonin' out when this dude came over and we talked for a little bit and then Clio came over and said you wanted to talk to me about something and t--NAW THAT'S COOL DON'T SAY 'HI'!" She was suddenly harassing a rather small boy who'd just stood up from that Terdor table and was just walking by.

In an effort to make a few new friends, Silas had, for once, sat away from Tally during dinner. He picked busily at his food for a good while, even as people left. Given the difficulties he had with silverware, it always did take him a while to eat. He watched Finn bother Helen, and later Clio, with a strong distaste...mostly because he simply disliked the large zombie.

Bean finally finished up, and began walking out of the hall, wiping a napkin between his hooves. Then, a familiar voice. He spun round abruptly, to see Helen. And there was someone else with her, someone he was unfamiliar with. Almost reflexively, his hooves went behind his back, as though they were just clasped hands, as was his habit. He always did this when meeting new people; just as well they didn't see his little goat-hands. Of course, nothing kept him from speech. "Oo. 'Allo Helen. Di'n't see ye thar." Silas glanced at the other boy out of the corner of his eye.

Otto couldn't even remember telling Clio that he'd had something to say to Helen, much less exactly what he'd supposedly meant to tell her. He broadcast this to his blonde friend through a blank look. Then Helen stopped midway through her sentence to verbally assault a younger student, and Otto laughed; her aggressive friendliness had always amused him.

"Who's this then, Helen?" he asked, not looking at her but instead fixing the Terdor boy with a welcoming smile.

"OH! That's right! Hee, sorry, I forgot, I guess you two don't know each other--this is B-Silas." Helen caught herself just in time. Most people referred to the little guy as 'Bean,' but, for the sake of introductions, his real name was probably more appropriate. Besides, the moody like satyr was likely to storm off if she used the abhorred nickname.

As it were, though, she was getting tired, as was proved by a massive yawn. "Ahh, I think I'ma go to bed now, lovelies. Maybe I'll see you in the common room later, Otto?" She stood and gathered her belongings. As she left, Helen patted Silas' furry arm, and muttered a quick, "G'night, Bean~"

She did not notice the slip.

"Yeah, see you!" Otto said with a wave before turning his attention back to the new kid. Silas. Except Helen had just called him Bean; a nickname he was sure. He beamed at him, eyes twinkling kindly. "So which is it really: Silas or Bean?" he asked. He knew how irritating nicknames could be, and by nature he hated to be the source of anyone's annoyance. He noticed, too, that the kid's hands were behind his back as though hiding something and couldn't help but smirk just a tiny bit, wondering if Helen had caught him in the middle of sneaking some cookies out of the dining hall or something.

Silas, who had been watching Helen as she left the dining area, jumped when he was addressed. "Oh er...s'joost 'Silas.'" He wondered if he should specifically tell the other boy not to call him by the other name. Usually when he did, people would go out of their way to do just that. This guy seemed okay though, so...

"Yeh, Lee--if yeh knoow 'im--he started callin' me 'Bean' b'coos he misread m'last name once...I'm noot too foond of it meself, but people do like to use it...." he shrugged and glanced away from the dryad to nothing in particular. Recalling his manners though, he returned to the older boy promptly. "Ooh, eh...Helen called yeh Otto?"

"Haha, I know Lee all right," Otto chuckled with a fond shake of his head. "He doesn't mean any harm. Well, usually. Anyway, yeah, I'm Otto, Otto Fisker. Great to meet you, Silas!" He cordially extended his right hand to shake, forgetting his earlier thoughts that the boy was hiding something behind his back.

"Oh, erm...." Silas suddenly looked very uncomfortable. He bit his lip, and seemed hesitant. Nevertheless, he finally pulled one arm out from behind his back. Thick curly fur reaching up to the armpits, adornments to the little hooves which were where hands belonged. "S'nice teh meet you too," Silas offered weakly. He extended the cloven extremity, cautiously though, and not far enough to touch Otto's hand. If the older boy didn't want to touch the abomination, that was perfectly understandable.

Otto's perpetual smile widened a little bit as he realized why Silas had been hiding his hands behind his back; he wasn't sneaking food, he was self-conscious about his hooves! How positively... well, for lack of a better term, adorable.

Otto clasped Silas's hoof firmly and gave it a friendly shake before releasing it. "Well, I know you were just leaving, but if you haven't really got to be anywhere it'd be great if you'd join me! I'm just finishing up, but I'm what Helen calls a social butterfly; she says I need conversation to live." He grinned broadly.

Silas' look of preemptive disappointed embarrassment was instantly replaced with a light smile. He felt a warm sense of relief when Otto didn't simply shy away from his freakish appendage. Then, he was invited to stay for a chat. "Er...sure, ookay." He clumsily slipped onto the bench beside Otto and absentmindedly reached for an apple, which he rolled around on the table under one hoof before finally taking a bite.

Otto grinned, taking a bite of mashed potatoes. "Well, you can't have been around terribly long, since I didn't know you," he joked lightly. "So what are you, like, a novice? How you likin' Icarus so far? And more importantly how is it that Helen got to you before me?" Small talk was awkward even if it was your hobby, so Otto liked to pepper his with self-depreciating humor, usually references to his exuberant nature.

His goat-like ears tilting forward, Bean listened intently to Otto as he took out a good half of the apple. At the question, he held up one hoof in what would have been a 'hold-on-one-minute' if he'd had a pointer finger for gesturing. Alas, he did not, but he finished chewing and swallowed soon enough. "Weel, I've been here a coople yars, actually; this's mah second. Weel ah like it quite a bit, I s'pose. Would be nicer if Lee'd cut it oof with all 'at 'Bean' bullshet, thoo." Silas scowled a little at no one in particular, his ears set back indignantly. "That's proobably how she knoows me...through Lee, I mean."

Feeling the awkward pressure of having to make smalltalk, Bean pushed on. "Soo, em...hoo long've you been here, then?"

Tally had known Silas all her life. Well, more accurately, she'd known him all his life. Their fathers had been close friends since boyhood, and when their children were born, they became close as kin. Tally still remembered the first time she'd met Silas. Well, it was less a meeting and more "they left the baby unattended so she'd sort of kidnapped him", but she remembered it nonetheless. After a good hour of searching, they'd found young Tally curled up in the back of a pickup truck, curled protectively around baby Silas. Their dynamic hadn't changed much since then, a fact she was completely okay with.

It wasn't typical of Tally to take things personally, but she tended to behave differently around Silas. Had anyone else sat away from her, she would barely have noticed. But when Silas chose to sit elsewhere, she was just a little hurt, and just a bit curious as to why. She watched him as she ate, noting that it was Otto he was talking to--a nice guy, not someone she'd think would hurt her Silas.

But that didn't mean he wouldn't.

She worried that the moment he took his hands hooves from behind his back, Otto would accidentally say something. It was probably a little shocking to people that weren't expecting it. She got up and started over toward them, trying not to draw too much attention to herself. Silas needed friends, and she was pretty good at scaring people off.

They'd already shaken hands by the time she got there. At least that seemed to have gone over well. Otto didn't look uncomfortable, and Silas seemed okay, but...well, better safe then sorry. Especially when it came to Silas.

She walked up behind her goat-friend and placed her hands on his shoulders, smiling. "Hey," she said softly, ruffling his hair a bit. Then she nodded to Otto. "Uh, hey Fisker." Her tone changed considerably when she addressed Otto, going quickly from soft and kind to cordial, yet gruff. She leaned her chin on Silas' head comfortably. "What's goin' on?"

Otto had opened his mouth to reply to Silas's question when Tallulah Fontaine appeared. While they weren't close by any means, Otto and Tally had attended Icarus together for some time now and therefore were at least on the level of passing conversation. He smiled up at her and noted her change in tone from when she greeted Silas to when she greeted him and guessed that he'd probably stolen the centaur's meal buddy.

"Hey, Tally!" he said jovially, unable to keep from ducking his head a little like a guilty child. "Sorry, Silas was just keeping me company. Helen left and he seemed nice and all. I hope I didn't steal him from you!" This was the complete truth, not a witty little nudge at Tally's protectiveness. Otto was kind to a fault.