Hakuren reached over to help and Arezu slapped his hand. "No. Nope. This is the first time I'm making cookies and I'm not letting you screw it up." There was a lot to unpack there, but more importantly: cookies.
With some focus, the batter seemed to look halfway decent after poured into the mold. The batter may be a lump mess, but if she got it all in it'd even out... right? Right.
Arezu, still unwilling to let Hakuren anywhere near their cookies, put the trey in the oven. "Okay. Celebi, can you keep an eye on them and let me know when they're ready?" Arezu asked nicely, putting her palm over Hakuren's face so he'd stop protesting. Hakuren immediately licked her hand.
"Augh! Haku!" She wiped her hand on her pants, then sighed. "I'm gonna go wash my hand so we aren't eating your cooties. Celebi, please keep an eye on him."
Arezu came back to find Hakuren and Celebi looking suspiciously innocent. "What did you do," she asked flatly.
Celebi tapped her fluffs together, looking very sheepish. "Um. Um it wasn't Kuu's fault. I just got distracted, and when- when I looked back... it was burnt. So. Um. I just... went...back in time... to fix it." Arezu groaned, long and loud. "And whose idea was that?""...Kuu's."
"Okay well. Whatever happened, we've got these cookies out here. I'm pretty sure we're past the park where you can ******** this up, so here." She popped a third of them on a plate for Hakuren, and a third on a plate for Celebi. They could all decorate them the way they liked.
Hakuren hummed to himself as he worked. He appeared to be decorating all three of his to look like himself, but appearances could be deceiving, eh? Celebi liked making them look like berries.
When they were finished with their decorations, Hakuren presented his with a cheeky smile. "You decorated them all to look like yourself? Seriously?" She was caught mid-chuckle as the illusion vanished, and two of the three cookies were replaced with shitty iced up versions of Arezu and Celebi. "C'mon, where's the art in all of them looking the same."
Damn, that was actually kind of sweet. They exchanged cookies, and Arezu made sure they didn't all get inhaled before they could present them to the judge. Not only did they get free cookies (!) but they also got prizes based on how well they did. They'd turned out a bit lumpy, sure, but the decorations went surprisingly well. Hopefully they wouldn't get dinged for points because two thirds of the cookies were definitely not halloween themed.
The cookies weren't realy enough for a meal or anything, but they weren't in the food section and the only other stuff to eat around here was sweets. Not... the worst thing in the world. But she wanted to have fun with the games and activites, not stuff her face and end up sick in the corner. "So, what next guys?" she asked, after they paused to play a quick game of darks involving drifloons that would have made Tanjoubi very uncomfortable.
"Let's do one of the rides," Hakuren said, eyes on a small coaster that peeked above the tents a few rows away.
"Oooh, yes!" Celebi exclaimed, floating towards the small ferris wheel. Arezu snorted when she heard Hakuren complaining, despite himself, "C'mon, that one's lame!"
Celebi gigled. "Well then Haku, lucky for you, it doesn't matter what we do." She paused, obviously waiting for him to respond, but he was onto her and just stared with a raised eyebrow. "What matters is who you do it with."
Game, set, match. Arezu thought to herself as she watched Hakuren struggle to argue. They went on the ferris wheel; it was surprisingly large for a mobile fair, and they could see pretty far from the top. Hakuren started rocking back and forth and Arezu quietly promised to murder him if he didn't stop.
At the top of the ferris wheel, their fate was sealed: Hakuren saw the haunted house. "Yes.""No.""Yes.""No.""Yes.""No.""Yes.""Fine.""Yes!"
Arezu vaguely hoped they'd not be able to find the place after they were on ground level, but curse her good sense of direction she knew exactly where they were. "There'd better not be any goddamn bats in here," she mumbled to herself as they stepped inside.
[ Total Tickets: 128 ] [ Haunted House 3o/o1 (No Spook) ] Party
"Smells kinda weird," Hakuren commented as they walked down the hall. When Arezu tilted her head questioningly, he elaborated. "It's too clean. It looks like it'd be musty and gross but it isn't." He shrugged, not really sure how else to explain it.
Arezu trailed her fingers along the wall for a moment. "It probably's because this was set up for the event. Not actually a haunted house, you know?"
Right after she said that, the clock at the end of the hall bonged out, and deafening gong that made all three of them jump. "Just....a well made... creepy house."
[ Total Tickets: 128 ] [ Haunted House 3o/o2 (SPOOK) ] Party
"Kuu, Zuzu, look!" Celebi came floating up, puffy hands pushed together and completely hiding whatever she was holding. "What've you got there, puffball?" Hakuren chuckled, and let the illusion fall. Wasn't super necessary inside the haunted house, after all.
Without the illusion it was clear that she was holding a single ticket. She tucked it in behind Hakuren's ear. "A treat for you~" she giggled. Then she zipped off, looking for a ticket to tuck behind Arezu's ear as well. "Celebi, hold up! Don't go too far!"
[ Total Tickets: 129 ] [ Haunted House 3o/o3 (+1 Ticket) ] Party
Celebi turned the corner, and moments later there came a loud bang. "Cel!" Hakuren dashed forward, hackles up. He and Arezu both saw an empty sitting room, with two airmchairs sat facing a fire.
Celebi was nowhere in sight.
"Where..." Arezu trailed off, noticing Hakuren relax. "Care to share with the class?" she joked.
Hakuren looked at her and grinned. "Wait for it..."
[ Total Tickets: 129 ] [ Haunted House 3o/o4 (SPOOK) ] Party
After a few moments, they both heard a quiet knock...from the other side of the fireplace. "Pfft." Hakuren clapped a hand to his mouth, wrapping the other one around his stomach.
Then with a loud bang, the entire fireplace rotated, flipping side to side... and spitting Celebi back out. "Woah, that was crazy!" She giggled, floating into the center of the room. Arezu was.... disturbed by her first thought, which was that she was glad Celebi was having fun instead of shaken by what happened as a form of some kind of PTSD. Woo look at us, bunch of well-adjusted kids, get us some medals.
[ Total Tickets: 129 ] [ Haunted House 3o/o5 (SPOOK) ] Party
"Hey Celebi, you see anything back there?" Arezu asked. She was pretty sure they were supposed to continue down the hallway, but she couldn't help but be interested in the super secret room.
Celebi shook her head. "Nope! I looked a bit, but, um... it was just a normal room. Lots of books, no window." Ah, so some kind of secret library. Pretty elaborate for a once a year kind of thing, she wondered if someone actually lived here or something normally. Was this even actually a house, or just made to look like one?
[ Total Tickets: 129 ] [ Haunted House 3o/o6 (No Spook) ] Party
"Oh! I did find this though!" Celebi pulled out a ticket and tucked it behind Arezu's ear. There, now she and Hakuren were matching. "Oh, and, mmm, I've been thinking."
Huh, what was this about? "About what?"
"About.. well I remember you talking about maybe having a name, a nickname. Something other than 'Celebi'. Um, and you wouldn't really understand what other Celebi call me, so I thought it would be nice."
[ Total Tickets: 13o ] [ Haunted House 3o/o7 (+1 Ticket) ] Party
"Oh, okay." Not the conversation she was expecting to have inside the haunted house. "Do you want to pick something?"
Celebi 'hmm'd'. "A little. I don't want something completely new, because I'm used to you two calling me Celebi. So I thought something similar... umm... Cecily?" She tapped her fingers together nervously.
Hakuren's ears briefly popped out of his illusion before disappearing again. "Yeah, yeah that's great! Cecily!" He grinned when she did, happy she was happy.
[ Total Tickets: 13o ] [ Haunted House 3o/o8 (No Spook) ] Party
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