Welcome to Gaia! ::

It wasn't like he didn't want to come here-but...he was nervous...
The tiny fae crept through those dancing or talking, going unnoticed as he tried not to think of how scary a costume was when he saw through the two cut holes... He bumped into someone and melted.

The person stared at the bundle of sheets before screaming about a real ghost, and those around began to scream. Some kids ran to their guardians, who looked about all dazed, and Dem turned from his chat with a woman to scan the crowd-he couldn't spot his bundle of sheets, and grew worried at the small amount of chaos. Those that hadn't seen the sheet fall were confused at those crying and screaming-and someone lifted the sheet, watching water dribble-

Dem approached and took the sheet, waving the man off and crouching at the puddle.

"Rontu-Rontu, are you alright?"

A bubbling noise occurred before the boy reshaped, whimpering into the other's arms and crying. Dem blinked, unsure of what to do-he scooped him up in his arms, shushing him and ignoring those staring as he comforted the boy on his shoulder. Tucking the now dry sheet over one arm he left the center of the gym to a corner, trying to calm the sobbing and startled boy with small words of comfort, and failing miserably.

Ugh, parenting was hard...

At the large thump, Dem looked over his shoulder as Rontu looked up...

Sniffling he wiped at them with a corner of the blanket as Dem recognized the girl and set Rontu down, reaching out to aid the little puppet in helping it's master.
"Are you alright?"

He asked softly, flashing her a wolfish smile as Rontu calmed down, hiccuping a bit and sniffling.
"Y...Yoko? Oh...h-hello...s-sorry... I... I got scared...."
He wiped at his eyes again as Dem handed him the blanket, flashing them a small smile.

His lucky little boy, having a friend-and a girl at that. How cute.
"I'll bring you two some punch..."
He left them, with Rontu looking fearfully over his shoulder back at Dem, who slid through the crowds and startled a few-was a werewolf really that scary for kids?

Eventually he changed back by the time he reached the punch bowl.
He poured two cups of punch, taking his time as he returned and handed them the cups, giving a glance at the odd little puppet before leaving again, just to go find someone to chat with while Rontu could loosen up around his friend.


Rontu was anything but loose, nervously holding the cup and pursing his lips a bit, taking small sips before looking up at her.
"Y....your costume is-is good...."

"Well, I never would have thought you'd dress like this in a million years." Deskri felt a grin spread across his face despite having previously been angry. "Self esteem? You shouldn't be having self esteem problems, you look fine. Really." The grin immediately turned into a frown. The idea of Sonnet with self esteem issues just seemed ridiculous.

Silas offered Sonnet a sheepish smile and then looked up at Syth. "Okey Nana. Bye." He turned on one heel and toddled off in no particular direction.

"Look there's a Mummy, lets go talk to him." Silas immediately changed directions upon spotting Zahur and made his way over there. "Hi. M'Silas." He offered a somewhat shy wave to Zahur. He stood still, blinking and only occasionally letting his eyes wander to the space above Eno and Zahur's heads.

"This is my first time as well, but I think it's nice so far. Aside from the screaming." Aiden winced at the loud noises that suddenly broke out in one part of the room. "Hahaha, yeah. In an effort to make the holiday more holiday-like, I think they decided that giving sugar to small children was a good idea. The toddlers in the room are bound to get waaaay too hyper if they get their hands on that stuff." The expression on Aiden's face said that he wasn't looking forward to such a thing.

River perked up at Ask's wave and immediately shuffled over to where he and Isolde were standing. "Hi, I haven't seen you guys in forever." A smile spread over his face in an instant. "You look really nice Isolde, I like the feathers. And your Jedi costume looks like the real thing." He examined his friend's costumes with excitement. Eno had only just recently explained Halloween to him and his brother, but River had already decided that it was going to be the best holiday ever. (Until Eno told him about Christmas, of course. Who doesn't love getting presents?)

Meanwhile, Eno leaned over to move some of Zahur's gause out of his eyes. "Is that better?" He patted his head lightly and then turned his attention to Silas who had seemingly appeared out of nowhere. The way the toddler spoke to no one and was staring at something he couldn't see made Eno a little nervous. Still, the child had given him no reason to bar interaction between him and Zahur, so he stayed quiet for the time being.

Rontu had probably been away from her for too long if everything at the store was scary. A disturbed look on her face as she turned her head away, trying to focus on some other noise she heard. And that's when she heard him say 'Can you see me'. The grin on her face right then and there as she quickly wiped it off her face. Perhaps, the blindness caused by her brother would be useful after all.

"Can I see you? Of course I..." She let herself hang by pretending, but of course her words had gotten to him. A pause as Mnejing move forward. Putting a hand forward and picking up the soaked blanket. Setting it back down when the blanket had actually spoken.

"...Stop being so silly Rontu," She muttered, placing a hand against her head, trying to think of something she could do to not make him afraid. What could be done? He's probably run away screaming if she popped up out of nowhere in his blanket on her.

"We need to make you braver..." Yep, it was decided, she'd try to make him less afraid again.

I was a strange time of year for Edmund. He could honestly say it was the first time things ever felt familiar to him. Sun had told him that maybe it was because it was the time of the year when he first got adopted. He was thinking about skipping the ball, after all, he wasn't sure he was going to know anyone there besides his brothers and sisters. He hadn't talked to Mira in a bit which had been making him feel kind of blue. But...Sun had really encouraged him to go. Apparently he'd been to one years ago and Sun was hoping he'd remember things. He supposed that would make it worthwhile.

So Edmund had journeyed home to help Sun shop for and dress the little ones. Dressing three children and a toddler in costume was a big task after all. He'd even got to pick out his own costume. He'd debated for a good bit between a cowboy and Indiana Jones an ended up with the second after a chorus of how cool Indiana was. Sun even gave him a real bull whip to use. He didn't want to think about why she had one laying around, but chalked it up to the strange assortment of weapons she had collected. She'd even made sure his outfit was all authentic leather too. Part of him felt that was kind of odd...since he was a cow meta, but...Sun was scary about her leather, so he didn't argue.

As he arrived at the ball Edmund again felt that strange familiar but not quite feeling. He shook his head slightly as if to chase away the feeling, and then looked around to see who else had arrived. He saw several people he did know, or at least had met. There was Deskri with a gothic looking girl who he was pretty sure he didn't know and his cousin Ask who looked like a very good Obi Wan who was talking to a very pretty girl who looked like a swan princess. He recognized Hank from pictures that Sun had shown him who was talking to Hayden, Gavin and Kei's friend, but that's where the recognizing ended. He couldn't help but feel disappointed. Even though Mira had been seemingly m.i.a. he'd hoped she'd be here. Then he spotted Aiden, dressed as a girl. He knew it was his friend by the distinctive markings but him being dressed as a girl just... Well it kind of hurt Edmund's brain, but in a strangely good way, which also disturbed him. After another little shake to his head for thought clearing, he made his way over to Aiden.

"Um..hey there Aiden." Edmund broke out into an amused grin as he waved.

Gavin was totally stoked for the Halloween ball. Surely there'd be plenty of his friends there and maybe he'd make some new ones. Plus he got to dress up in a totally awesome costume. He was Puss in Boots. Totally suave, tricky, and awesome. It fit him to a tee, in his opinion anyway. He had a hat with a totally sweet feather, some kick a** boots, a dashing cloak, and he even had a sword. Oh yeah. He was cool. The only thing that wasn't cool was his brother Kei's costume, it made him pretty mad but, he just planned not to talk to him the whole night. But really, Kei wasn't even a fairy, what gave him the right to dress up like he did?

With a definite swagger to his step Gavin entered the scene giving the room a good scan. So many other kids and cool costumes. Oh and girls, there were some pretty girls too. Even though he was just a kid, he definitely was already interested in girls, though guys were sometimes of interest to him too. The older girl dressed kind of gothic like was a total babe, and the other girl talking to Ask was a beauty too. Then there was the green haired one that Edmund was talking too. He wondered if it was Mira. He could see what Edmund saw in her if it was, though.... there was something kind of odd about her. Gavin wasn't going to give it much more thought though. Instead he strutted on over to the snack table and took a cookie, trying to decide which lovely lady to talk to first.

A Halloween Ball. Kei had been barely able to contain his joy at the thought. It meant costumes, dancing, and lots of candy. He'd picked his costume with care and much debate. It would have to be something that made some sense to have heels like he did for, but also something that looked good and that made him feel happy. After talking about it with Sun for a while they'd decided he should be Oberon king of all fairies. He thought it was exciting and dramatic. Gavin and Willow however were actually a little upset by it. Well mainly Gavin, and he'd poisoned Willow against it too, Kei was sure of it.

But it didn't matter because he looked amazing, or at least that's what Kei told himself. His clothes were in a Renaissance style and colored deep purple and black, Sun had somehow made wings to match, covering his more demonic looking ones, he had a crown made of leaves, and finally she had helped him weave ivy around his horns. Yes, he had the most elaborate and wonderful costume out of his siblings, and that was all that mattered.

Looking around, Kei's eyes first fell on Ask and Isolde, so he made a beeline for them. Isolde's costume was beautiful and he wanted to see it up close, and besides, Ask and Isolde were some of his favorite people. There was also a boy he'd never met before, but he thought he looked familiar.

"Greetings everyone." He gave his hello in a tone that he thought was fitting for a king, a bit haughty and important. But it was accompanied by a bright smile, which softened his whole demeanor. He awaited their reply nervously, since this was the first time they'd all see him with his heels.

Willow was so excited she could barely contain herself. She was skipping here and there and making excited noises the whole way to the ball. She'd come with her brothers, and her mom had stupid Nadia in tow. Halloween seemed so exciting. Tricks and spooky things and costumes and candy and...! There were so many things she liked she couldn't name them all. Her own costume was that of a pirate. Not a girl pirate, a boy pirate. All the girl costumes had looked stupid to her. Plus it was hard to run around and cause mischief properly in a skirt. Her mom had gotten her a sword and an eye-patch and everything, and had done her make up to give her a very real looking scar across her eye under the patch.

There seemed to be a lot of people there that Willow had met before. She did plan to make her rounds but first... CANDY! She made a beeline for it and began picking out her favorite types to eat.

Despite the rest of her siblings thoughts on the subject, Halloween seemed stupid to little Nadia. It was a holiday for weirdos, and for fat kids who liked to gorge on candy. The only thing that she could be convinced to dress as without throwing a fit was a witch. The pointy hat was kind of neat, and plus, being a witch meant she got to be mean to people if she wanted to right?

As she was set down by her mother, Nadia took a good look at the people that had arrived. She recognized Ask and Hank, but...wasn't too interested in seeing them right now. Ugh. The only thing that seemed overly interesting to her was the creepy things in the corners, so she went to take a look.

Sonnet laughed meekly. "It's a bit too late for that Deskri. I've had them for a while actually, I'm just pretty good at covering them up..."

She then looked at Syth and extended her hand to her. "It's odd how we've seen each other without ever really being properly introduced to one another, isn't it? Well, it's nice to finally meet you Syth. I'm Sonnet, but you probably already knew that."

Cedric winced at the noise. Deep breaths, deep breaths. He couldn't loose control. Deep breaths. Yeah, ok, he was good now.

"If it gets too out of hand I might have to go outside..." he said with a bitter sigh. For everyone's own good. "For the most part it should be entertaining at least. We'll see."

Zahur nodded as the gause was removed from his eyes. "Yes! Thankyu daddy!"

At the sound of another voice, his eyes moved to see Silas. He waved back to be polite, smiling, though it was sort of hard to see it.

"Zahur," he said, offering his name to the boy.

Ask grinned at River and complimented his sheep outfit when he saw him. He really didn't think there was a better costume out there for him. When Isolde mentioned dancing Ask looked vaguely horrified. He'd never danced. He hoped no one would make him. "I'd like to see you dance Isolde. But I don't think I want to dance. We Jedi should be on guard."

Soon he heard the doors to the gym open again and in came the crowd of his cousins. Edmund was Indiana Jones and looked really good. Ask kind of wanted the bullwhip. Gavin made a great ... cat? And Kei of course looked wonderful as a fairy. How could Kei look bad? Ask thought it was probably impossible. Willow looked like a rather dangerous pirate-good for her- and Nadia looked evil... situation normal.

When Kei came over and acted all kingy Ask knew that he had to be a king of fairies, not just a run of the mill fairy. "You look great your Majesty!" Ask told him

When Adeline and Theo came through the doors Ask almost growled. Why did the snakey thing have to come ruin the ball?! Such a shame. He'd have to make sure he didn't touch anything that she touched. Who knows what kind of strange scaley diseases she had. "Yuck." He muttered to himself and cast a glare in her direction. He fluttered all four of his wings in disgust. He hoped Theo had been able to avoid catching anything from her.