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Somewhere in all that debris, Muka managed to find the scrags before he did and... Did he really need to say what Muka did, HE ATE IT THAT'S WHAT HE DID!

Sheridan shuddered, how could he eat that thing? It was furry, and it was alive! Eww!

(( safety net - pass! on to stage three! ))

"If you're hungry, there's a nice sandwich cart in town..."

Not to mention all the many booths that had food. Did Muka really need to eat the scrags, wasn't that rather...defeating the point of the booth?

Oh scrags, he caught a hint of the third one's tail as it darted into the maze. Nope, not getting away that easily!

(( stage three - pass! ))

I'm the scrags master, I've mastered the scrags! I am winner #2 today! My SN is: Amon

Art-hur? That was an unusual name. Alexander continued to frown as Yin picked the...rabo? Off of his skeletal foot. The zomboil was pretty sure it was a rabo, anyways. Three tails, fluffy, fox-like...only it was white, and he also assumed a male though he'd seen Yin make the mistake between males and females before. Soooo, that meant that Yin now had two rabo's. Well, good for him. He'd always liked Princess Eva better then his bonded anyways, so now he could double his happiness.

The zomboil wasn't still just the tiniest bit bitter about that. Nope.

"He's very cute." Alex's mom piped up, and Alex shot her a bit of a dark look. She hated minipets.

"Yes." Alex nearly growled. "Cute." And then another thought occurred to him, and in true Alex fashion, he blurted out the question that made it's way into his brain before even thinking about it. "How is Princess Eva taking to the new addition?"

Mentally face palming again. He didn't care how Princess Eva was taking to the newest addition. Why why why would he ask that?

Alexander got this sinking feeling that he just put his foot in his mouth and had inadvertently done or said something absolutely awful. It was like his heart just plummeted in his chest and everything inside him went cold(er). The second the sentence was out of his mouth he'd felt stupid, but now he just felt like an a**, and he didn't even know why. All he really knew for sure is that he had upset Yin, and that the other boil had paled and now looked like he was about to cry. It was all the zomboil could do to fight against his instincts to step forward and wrap his arms around him, to tell him that it would be okay. He glanced over to his mom, who was looking back at him, her own facial expression as confused as his own, but in his eye he was pleading with her to do something.

And so she did. She was the one who stepped forward, and grabbed ahold of Yin to pull him into a hug, even though she also had no idea why he might suddenly look so upset. And while she did so, Alex took a moment to think, to work out what he had done wrong. He wasn't stupid. If Princess Eva never got a chance to meet him, that meant that Yin had either gotten rid of her, or she'd run away (both very very unlikely scenarios), or there was the third option, but that....that couldn't...

"I'm so sorry..." His eye widened a little as the only explanation that made sense finally crammed it's way into his brain so that it was the only one that could possibly be. His voice was barely above a whisper. Princess Eva, the minipet that Yin cherished and loved beyond anything else...

"Oh jack I'm so sorry, Yin." He felt awful, and..yes, he was starting to back away, because he didn't know how to deal with this. He couldn't deal with this without being allowed to touch him. He felt like he was about to cry as well, if he even could anymore. It seemed like he should have run out of tears long before now. Still, the sensation of needing to cry was there, and he just could not deal with this.

He was about five seconds away from bolting. Or at the very least, shuffling away at a very accelerated pace for him.

Meanwhile Alex's mom still had no idea what was going on, but hugging was always the best thing to do, right?

At some point Alex forced himself to stop backing away. closing his eye tight, lowering his head. He did not want to see this. He did not want to see Yin crying because there was absolutely nothing he could do about it. He had no right to even try and do anything about it anymore. If he had been broken up inside earlier from being forced to see Yin at every turn, those pieces were now beginning to shatter further still. What he wouldn't do to be able to erase that sadness from Yin's eyes.

Alex's mom was doing what she could, however. Making comforting hushing sounds, rubbing her hand against the top of Yin's back, hugging him tight and only relenting when he made an effort to pull away, not offering any resistance as she took a small step back from him and studied his face, casting a quick glance over her shoulder towards Alex, who was now standing quite some distance off. She may have thought a few nasty unmotherly like thoughts towards him at that point, most of which could have been summed up by the word coward.

"Yin Cang..would you like me to stay for a while? Alexander probably needs to get back to helping Mei with her booth, but I can stay." She really wasn't in a giant rush to leave, especially now. The train would be running all night and it's not like she needed to sleep or anything.

"You would not be keeping me, Yin Cang." She replied, offering him another warm smile, trying to chase away the last of his tears with kindness. When she glanced over towards Alexander again, it was to see that he was indeed gone, and she frowned to herself, wondering how he had managed to move so quickly. She did hope he had just gone back to the DDD booth. She wasn't about to leave without saying goodbye to him as well!

"Really, I have all the time in the world." She turned back to him and beamed, not letting her consternation towards her son show.

"It is fine. Everything will be fine." She reached out to clasp his hand in hers, then reached her other hand out to pat the top of the one of his that she held in comfort. If she had any idea what she was comforting him for that might have helped but this would have to do for now.

"Here, how about I help you clean up before I leave?" She wasn't about to take no for an answer, and she pulled her hands away from his as she turned around and set herself to work, picking up fallen down merchandise, cleaning up garbage, tidying up as only a housewife and mother of one very lazy and often times disgusting zombie could.

Cleaning up. Things were looking good. The Lady Van Rotte had a smile on her face simply because she was doing something that she actually enjoyed doing, and hopefully beyond that was helping to cheer up a certain weepy weremantis. It was just as she was scooping up some final few scraps of rubbish lying about that a shadow fell over her, and she straightened back up to face her wayward son with a very umimpressed look on her face.

"Here." He said, holding out a cup to her, small wisps of steam still rising up from it into the evening air. "Give that to him. Green tea. Probably wont help much but..." He shrugged, keeping his voice low and murmured, as though Yin couldn't see what Alex was doing. "He likes tea."

The look on Alex's mom's face softened as she took the cup away from him, her earlier thoughts of how inconsiderate and cowardly he was behaving vanishing in an instant.

"I think you should say goodbye now, mom. And I'll walk you to the train station as well. Things are beginning to wind down, Mei doesn't really need my help so should be fine on her own for a while. Lets just...get out of here, please." He was hoping that this time at least she would agree, and she nodded, before turning back towards Yin and making her way towards him.

"I'm about finished here." She said, softly, then held out the cup of tea towards him. "Alex brought this for you." If her son had wanted to remain anonymous, it wasn't happening, not while she was there at least. She would wait for him to take the cup away from her and smile.

"It was lovely to see you again, Yin Cang, but I think it's finally time for me to leave. I hope I'll get to see you again soon?"

"Of course I will tell him, though I'm sure he already knows. And thank you, Yin Cang, for visiting with me." She gave him one last warm smile, tempted to hug him goodbye though not wanting to have scalding tea accidentally spilled on her. So, with one last parting wave and a "Goodbye." she turned to leave, making her way to her son and linking her arm in his.

Alexander cast one last look behind him back towards Yin, still feeling terrible about earlier and wishing there was more that he could do, before turning his face forward again and leading his mom silently away from the booth and out of the festival grounds.