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The day had been a long one: tempers ran as high as the thermometer at noon, and considering it was the dead of summer, that was saying quite a bit. Inle had been breaking up fights between children and pets all day in between bouts of productivity in her basement darkroom. She couldn't stand to be in there for too long; there were no windows down there, and she never could stand the heat. Finally, at long last, the younger kids were in bed and most of the pets were asleep, having used their energies bickering amongst themselves. Inle was enjoying the quiet time, having retreated to her room for the night.

The humidity that had made the summer heat an almost tangible being had condensed in the night air, creating a shroud of dense fog. The light of the full moon shining high above it had turned it a dull, yet ethereal, grey. It blanketed the entire house and the land around it; indeed, if lights hadn't been shining from several windows, one never would have known that there was a house there at all. Inle's window was open to the cloying night air, and she leaned out of it as if seeking the misty embrace. Her hands were placed upon the windowsill, and a shard of what appeared to be a broken mirror rested securely between them, unseen in plain sight. It was about the size of one of Inle's small hands, and as there was very little light for it to reflect, it was no surprise that she didn't see it. Oddly enough, the glass wasn't reflecting the person that stood above it; it too saw the fog, and seemed to be waiting eagerly for something to break the ashen monotony.

The sudden sound of a shriek cut through the otherwise silent night, and a dim streak of light could be seen through the heavy mist. There was a dull explosion, and the one light turned into many, of varying colors. The racing colors looked like neon specters in the thick cloak of mist, streaking through it effortlessly with neither point nor purpose. Although the fourth was days ago, July's holiday began to be celebrated all over again in spite of the fact that its lights weren't readily visible. Inle smiled at the light show, watching the continued performance avidly. It seemed she wasn't the only one, as the shard reflected it as well.

It was over all too soon, and it was only as Inle reached out to close the windows that she noticed the shard. Her eyes immediately narrowed in suspicion; a stray piece of glass had to mean that a mirror, somewhere in the house, was broken. Carefully, she swept it with one hand into the other, sighing. She didn't really have the energy to play Where's Waldo with the house's mirrors, and figured she'd find it in the morning...hopefully, her kids had enough sense to stay away from broken glass. That thought in mind, she was fully expecting to be awoken the next morning when one of them cut themselves on it.

The muffled popping did little to penetrate Inle's unconscious mind, at first. She had been dreaming of swimming, not in a pool, but in a moonlit lake. Johnny Depp was there, and so was Christian Bale, and they were both naked. Ah, yes, it was a good dream.

All of a sudden, the water in the lake turned into stale, greasy popcorn. The moonlight was replaced by the harsh glare of an overhead spotlight. Johnny Depp and Christian Bale were gone; a half-eaten hot dog and a cotton candy stick took their respective places. Blaring, overly happy pipe-organ music played from some unknown source. Inle, bobbing in the popcorn, could see clowns and elephants in the distance.

Her wonderful dream had turned into her worst nightmare. Rather than jerking into wakefulness as others might, she eased into it slowly, fingers clenching the covers in frustration over her lost fantasy.

It was only then that she noticed the popping. She stared blankly at the ceiling, trapped between slumber and awareness.

"Damn kids," she mumbled in a voice still thick with sleep, "setting off fireworks at this hour." With that, she rolled over, an arm dangling over the side of the bed. Her eyelids readied themselves to close once more, and they might have, if the eyes they housed hadn't caught sight of dim colors washing over her lax fingertips. This caused them to shoot open once more. Inle wiggled her fingers in the dim light, wondering at it for a moment before noticing that the light was significantly brighter around the bed, as if it was coming from just under it. She also noticed that the popping hadn't stopped; if anything, it sounded louder.

Inle rolled off the bed with all the grace of a drunken whale, getting down on hands and knees at its side. Carefully, she reached for the edge of the long blanket. In one sudden motion, as if she sought to act before she lost her resolve, she lifted it up and peeked under the bed.

Immediately, the light and sound stopped, vanishing without a trace. Even in the sudden darkness, Inle could just barely make out a shape. Quickly, she got to her feet and stumbled towards the nightstand, stubbing her toe in her haste to turn on the bedside light. She winced, an aftereffect of both the sharp pain and the sudden flood of light. Resuming her former position, she peered beneath the bed once more, eyes widening in stunned disbelief at the figure that had taken up residence there.

It was a baby. A little boy, from what Inle could tell, and he didn't seem to care that his hiding place had been discovered. He seemed relaxed, knees bent, the soles of his feet flat on the carpet. A hand was placed upon his stomach and his free arm pointed straight up, a finger poking at the underside of the mattress. Inle could faintly see some sort of markings along his outstretched arm, light against dark skin, but it was too dark for her to make them out. She stared unnoticed at the boy for a long, quiet moment.

"Hey," she said conversationally.

The boy's poking stopped.

"You're under my bed."

His head slowly turned towards her, and he blinked at her owlishly.

"How'd you get under there, anyway? And where'd you come from?"

His arm dropped from its position in the air, flopping almost noiselessly at his side.

Inle sighed, squirming a bit; the position was hardly comfortable. "Well, you can't stay under there all night. C'mon out."

Silence, and a blank stare.

Another sigh, and Inle wiggled an arm under the bed. Her hand inched towards the boy. If she could only snag an arm or a leg, she could drag him towards her; the floors were carpeted, he'd be fine.

The boy's eyes moved sluggishly from her face to her questing hand. What did she want? Whatever it was, he didn't want any part of it. Being born was exhausting, and now all he wanted to do was sleep. With a slight frown, he batted at her hand, trying to make the funny squished lady go away. His mouth opened slightly in surprise as his hand was abruptly grabbed, and he tried fruitlessly to wrench it free. Great, now she was pulling on it! Didn't this crazy lady know that it wouldn't come off, no matter how hard she pulled?

The bright flaring of the boy's tattoos were Inle's only warning before multicolored flashbulbs went off before her eyes. Startled, she jerked back with a surprised sound, rubbing at her eyes in an attempt to make the spots stop dancing in front of them. The child took that opportunity to squirm onto his stomach and crawl--slowly, awkwardly, as movement itself was brand new to him--out from beneath the bed. He was about halfway to the door when he tripped on the long hem of the one-sleeved tunic he wore and sprawled with a tiny whoosh onto his stomach.

That would prove to be his undoing, as it gave Inle just enough time to regain her vision and stride across the room, placing her feet directly in front of the boy. He stared at her rainbow-colored socks for a moment before slowly getting back to his hands and knees, his head butting harmlessly against Inle's shins as he tried to move forward.

What was wrong with this lady?! Why couldn't she just let him sleep in peace?! If this is what existance was like, he'd just as soon go back into the void, thankyouverymuch. And why--

His half-formed train of thought paused on its tracks as Inle sighed and bent to pick him up. The boy blinked at this sudden change in height, legs kicking at empty air before Inle held him against her, a motherly gesture from the most unmotherly of people. He yawned as Inle pulled back the heavy blanket--she was always cold, even in summer--and didn't struggle as she tucked him into bed. And why should he? Being atop the bed was much better than being under it, and as long as crazy lady didn't interrupt his sleep, well...that thought was left unfinished as the weary toddler finally got the rest he sought.

Inle took the opportunity to sit on the bed next to the boy. She wasn't sure where he came from--she wasn't sure she wanted to know--but she had long since learned that random children popping up in the vicinity of anywhere she happened to be at any given time usually meant they were in her care, at least for the duration. This one, it appeared, would be no different. With a sigh, she turned off the light before crawling into bed next to her newest charge.

She hadn't even noticed that the shard was gone.

Inle was a genius. She had grown bored with trying to pick a name that suited the rainbow-themed toddler; none out of the supposed 10,001 the Best Baby Names of All Time had to offer seemed to fit. The fact that she had tossed the book to the side in a fit of frustration upon reaching "E" was irrelevent. This new plan...this would solve everything.

Rather than turn to books or the internet for possible names, she turned to her rather large CD collection. Albums had been pulled from the bookcase that housed them all, seemingly at random. These chosen few had been arranged into a circle; the as-of-yet unnamed child sitting on the bed seemed to regard this with confusion that only grew once he was placed in the middle of this ring of disc-based music. Rainbow-colored eyes looked up at Inle, baffled.

"Pick one," Inle urged, a slight smile upon her face. The idea was for him to pick one and give Inle a list of name choices based on the members of the band of the chosen album. She took the child's previous spot on the bed and watched, not bothering to brush a chunk of purple-striped black out of her eyes.

The child looked at her dubiously. This lady was clearly out of her mind, even one so young as he could tell. Not only that, he didn't quite catch her meaning. Pick one? Pick one what? Is this really what she had taken him away from crawling after the Feli from?

"Go on, pick a CD." If Inle knew that the baby didn't know what a CD was, she didn't seem to care. All she was curious about was the CD his chubby little hand would eventually pick up. Would he turn out to be a Neil (Hannon, of The Divine Comedy)? A Karsten, of Horrorpops fame? Or--and here she shuddered--a Maynard, the brains behind both Tool and A Perfect Circle?

She and the baby shared a long, silent look, culminating in the child's roll to all fours. Inle sat forward in anticipation, watching as he began to move forward, towards the ring of CDs...and right past it. She groaned, head falling forward. So much for that idea. The rustling of paper slowly brought her head up, her hat more than a little skewed. She stared blankly at the child that was now sitting up, what used to be a neat pile of mail scattered haphazardly in front of him. Curious, she rose and walked over, casting him in her shadow as she looked down upon him. He seemed to have found a catalogue, no doubt drawn to it by the bright colors on its cover. She watched him stare at it for a moment, bemused as he abruptly stuck a corner of it in his mouth. With a sigh, she bent and scooped both the baby and his newfound toy up.

"Give that here, kid," she said in a nonthreatening tone as she tried to wrestle the catalogue from the child's surprisingly strong grasp. They battled over it for no more than a moment, Inle trying to gently tug it from his arms while he clutched it as if it were the greatest treasure. Inle immediately dropped her hand when his tattoos started glowing, however; she well-remembered what happened the last time she had seen THAT. "Alright, have it your way," she sighed. He cuddled closer to her as if in consolation and she took that opportunity to get a good, long look at the book-turned-chewtoy.

The front cover bore a camera--it was digital, and as a traditionalist, Inle wasn't quite sure what kind it was--and brightly-colored letters promising cheap buys and good deals, if only one would open the cover. Inle had no intention to--not now, that it was covered with baby drool. One word on the cover stood out more than the others. It was a simple bold, red font that read the name of the company the catalogue was representing: Calumet. As a photographer, Inle was familiar with them. It wasn't rare for her to peruse their website from time to time simply for the convenience of shopping online; why leave the comfort and relative safety of her home when the postman would brave all manner of shitty weather for her?

"Calumet..." she muttered. "Well," she said, sighing yet again, "it'll do."

Sleepover link

Calumet's favorite thing to do was watch cartoons. He was an almost constantly happy baby, but in front of the television was where he was happiest. Inle could count on him staying on the couch, where she would put him, as long as the tv stayed on. She was confident that the mindless violence portrayed in all sorts of comical fashions wouldn't affect him--he was, after all, just a baby, and a relatively good one at that.

She was wrong.

While it was true that Calumet loved cartoons, his infantile mind often wondered why one character would be so mean to another. Sylvester just wants to play with you, Tweety! Why do you have to hit him with frying pans? And Roadrunner, why do you send the cute doggy guy off cliffs? It confused him, and made him sad; why couldn't they all just get along? He certainly didn't have any trouble getting along with the many members of his family (Tybalt couldn't stand him--couldn't stand much of anyone, really--but he didn't know that).

So he did the only thing he could do: he cheered for the so-called villians, hoping they would live long enough to achieve their goal--he didn't understand that what the animated terrors did was supposed to be wrong--and he made faces at the "heroes," and he cried quietly every time the bad guys lost.

Reserved for first steps. eek

Asrafel hopped up to the door of Inle and Calumet's residence, after having stealthily retrieved their address from records he knew he was not supposed to be looking in. He never would have done such a thing if there hadn't been motives that drove him to the mischief he'd been causing lately. Still, he'd waited until Alania left for the day and went through all of her files, finally finding the one that had led him to the doorstep he stood on that very moment.

He quickly fixed the arrangement of colorful carnations in the bouquet he held, before hiding them behind his back. He wanted the flowers to be a surprise for Calumet, whom he hadn't seen in far too long. He only hoped they were home at the moment!

"Knock knock~" He singsonged as he knocked on the door, awaiting some form of an answer. He was in a ridiculously cheerful mood today, and whether or not that had anything to do with events that had transpired previously to this one was a mystery never to be solved.