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 Posted: Wed Jun 03, 2009 4:46 pm
.:A new arrival:.
It was a lovely day for a family picnic. It was sunshiney and hot and Emmaline and Maxwell Peace had decided to take their two adopted sons out into the field behind what was left of the barn for sandwiches and some good ol' family time. The road to hell, as they say, is paved with the very best of intentions.
Warren did not want to leave the house. The cyclops baby screamed his fury and beat his impotent little fists on Emma's shoulder as she carried him down the stairs. His reluctance could probably be attributed to the fact that if they'd all gone out and left him alone, the troublesome tot could easily have escaped his crib and managed to find the AA batteries he'd been wanting. But, to no avail.
"We can play with the kittens, baby!" Emma said brightly, effectively shutting Warren up. Oddly, the cyclopic ex-interplanetary-criminal was fascinated with cats. He loved them.
Darsh, the older of the two boys, did not want to go because he would be there. The he in question being Warren, Darsh's unwanted and uninvited baby brother. It wouldn't have been so bad if both boys weren't blue-skinned. But Darsh took it as a personal insult that the stupid squalling infant was stealing all his attention AND had copied his coloring as well.
"We can fish in the pond, buddy!" Max cajoled the older of the two boys, his tone wheedling. Darsh crossed his arms, a stormy look crossing his face. For a moment, the sun's brightness seemed to wane. "We can... uh.. I made croissants!" Max finally settled on. If the roll-and-bake pillsbury kind even really counted. But Darsh, with his greediness for rich food, decided to bury the more or less one-sided hatchet between him and his brother for the time being. Darsh, consequently, was more of a dog person.
The blanket was big and checkered red-and-green, some ancient christmas throwback. The cooler was full of faux-bologna and vegetable sandwiches, rolls, cookies, corn and any number of deliciousness. Darsh dove into the food immediately while Warren seemed more interested in scooting on hands and knees through the grass, hunting the new litter of kittens.
"They've been acting kind of strange." Emma noted, chewing on a carrot.
"Strange? Who?" Max dipped his own carrot in hummus and took a satisfying bite.
"The cats. Not all of them, just some of them. They're silly."
"Cats are supposed to be silly, Emma. They're cats."
"No, I mean the other day I found a bunch of them sort of.. congregated in the barn. They were all lined up and staring at the ceiling."
Max rolled his eyes. "You have to stop smoking so much weed." He informed his sister with a tolerant smile. "You're starting to see things. Cats don't ---" Whatever he was going to say, it was cut off by the sight of an aged old man in a trenchcoat sprinting through their field. "What the hell?"
"What? Who is that?" Emma squinted at the man. "We don't know him, do we?"
"No, we don't." Max said suspiciously as, behind him, the half of the barn that hadn't exploded when Warren's pod had landed burst into flame.
"Oh my god!" Emma screamed.
"Oh my god!" Darsh repeated after her, his golden eyes round with an odd mixture of fear and apprehension. Only bad things happened when barns caught on fire. Burning barns meant more brothers, and that was never a good thing as far as he was concerned.
Warren just stared. His mind was shouting frustrated curses in his native alien tongue, but his infantile mouth couldn't actually say them and his limited telepathy was not reaching anyone at the moment. So, for all intents and purposes, Warren just stared.
Luckily, the fire wasn't a big one. Max and Emma had both sprinted to the barn where a small bonfire seemed to blaze. Oddly enough, it was blazing right where Emma had seen the cats gathering to stare at the ceiling. She found herself pausing to look upwards, but there was nothing there. The woman shivered and helped Max stamp out the flames.
"What the hell?" She muttered at her brother, who shook his head helplessly and looked back at her.
"heck-heck" came a tiny coughing noise from behind the kiln. Max and Emma exchanged a single look that spoke volumes, but is was Darsh who dashed between them towards the sound of the coughing first.
"Noooo!" The older blue boy shouted, stomping his foot. The sun was decidedly hidden behind clouds now.
Max stepped forward to see what Darsh had found. "Oh." He said quietly, raising an eyebrow.
Emma joined him. "Oh." She repeated, also quietly.
The squirming little bundle looked up at them all with big eyes and raised it's paws towards them. "Can has fud?" It asked with a pointy little grin.
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Posted: Wed Jun 10, 2009 4:17 pm
.:I heart U, Fud:.
"Look. Fuds." The small lolcat-boy narrowed his eyes in a predatory fashion, his tail swishing behind him, butt high in the air.
"Not those, dummy." Darsh whispered, casting a glare at his new little brother. At least this one could talk. And he wasn't blue. The fact that Hayden looked nothing like Darsh went a long way to the grudging relationship they had struck up. Grudging on Darsh's side, that is. Hayden was enthusiastic enough for the both of them and had taken to following Darsh around without invitation.
"Can't has?" Hayden's eyes got bigger and bigger and bigger, a little frown twitching at his lips. He looked absolutely pitiful.
"You don't want chickens, stupid."
"Nuggetz!"
"There are no nuggets on chickens. Thats what we want." Darsh pointed and Hayden's gaze followed his brother's arm.
"Big fuds." He'd never seen a cow before. Three of them stood in the pasture, lowing softly and chewing their cud. "We huntz?"
"We don't huntz." Darsh cringed and shook his head. "We are not hunting them." He repeated, this time in appropriate english. Hayden's bizarre speech pattern had an irritating way of rubbing off on people.
"But they haz flavr. Yes?"
"You don't want their flavor. You want their milk."
"Milkz?"
"Urgh." Darsh groaned, running a hand through his star-studded hair. "Just... come with me. Shut up and come with me." Grabbing Hayden by his little black hand, he pulled the kitten across the small pasture and into the barn. Once inside, he looked around furtively. "Good. Nobody is here."
"Bad guise?"
"Sure, Hayden. Bad guys. We dont want anyone to see us." Golden eyes flicked across the barn until they hit paydirt. Glistening moistly in tall metal buckets. He could smell it from across the room.
Apparently Hayden could smell it too. "What is? Is we in heaven?" The lolcat's eyes were partially closed with bliss. Darsh knew the feeling, he recalled with clarity the first time he'd discovered the cows and the barn on the neighboring farm. Of course, farmer Ben was a cranky man. But that was what Hayden was there for.
"Yeah, buddy. Heaven." Darsh grinned and pulled his new brother towards the milk. There was a dipper hanging to the side and he skimmed it across the top. The milk was warm and pure and fresh. Completely untampered with. "Definitely heaven." He handed the dipper down.
The fresh milk appeared to have a sort of druggish effect on Hayden. "I has a happy." He mumbled, raising up on his tiptoes to see into the milk pail. "You are my happy, fud." He crooned to the thick white substance, a stupid grin spread over his face.
Darsh knew the feeling. Fresh milk, especially stolen milk, had a similar effect on him. The sound of footsteps outside of the barn and a cheery whistled tune snapped him out of it immediately, though. "Farmer Ben!" Darsh glanced around for the nearest escape route. "Hayden, you cover me!" He said before sprinting away.
And so it was that farmer Ben found a clearly guilty but immensly innocent looking cat-child bathing in his milk pail. And so it was Darsh made his escape as planned. And so it was Hayden discovered a happy. Hayden also discovered that farmer Ben was Not Nice when cats got into his cream.
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Posted: Wed Jun 24, 2009 11:08 am
.:Hayden Can Has Cheezburger:.
"The floor. It is lava!" Hayden shouted, clinging to the couch and poking little holes in the upholstery with his claws. It was a lucky thing that the little lolcat could amuse himself - and when he wasn't sleeping he seemed to be an inexhaustable ball of energy - because Darsh was disinclined to play games with Hayden and Warren was, although developmentally more advanced, still a baby and couldn't even walk.
"I must save teh princess!" He added, pulling up a couch cushion and flinging it to the floor. He threw another and then a third until he had what could only be presumed to be a safe stepping-stone passage leading to the stairway.
With a triumphantly ear-splitting howl, Hayden leapt onto the first cushion and then the second, and then the third until he finally made it safely to the stairs. "Take that, lavas." He muttered with a grin, his tail raised up high behind him. Then, turning, he regarded the imaginary guard at the stairs.
"My princess is in another castle? Oh noooooes!" With a dramatic wail, he flopped onto the floor in despair and then started writhing until he saw a pair of shoes. Looking up, he saw Max standing over him with hands full of grocery bags. "You gots a one-ups, dad? I's ded."
"You're dead?" Max asked with an amused raise of the eyebrow. "How did that happen?"
"I falled in teh lava. Now I is ded. You has one-up?"
"I might have something in here that will do the trick, sport. Why don't you come into the kitchen with me and help me to unpack the groceries?"
Hayden lost no time in scrabbling into the kitchen and leaping up to sit on the counter. Grocery day was the best day! And it was even better if you could be there while the groceries were still being unpacked. That meant you got a chance at the goodies before anyone else did - provided that you didn't get caught stealing what was probably supposed to be tuesday's dinner.
Max started pulling all sorts of exciting things out of the bags. He set the fresh veggies on the counter and turned to put the organic free-range ground turkey in the fridge. Hayden took the opportunity to rifle around in the bag nearest him.
"CHEEZBURGER!" There was a loud, triumphant shout and Max turned to see his son chewing happily on one of the squeaky toys he'd bought for the dogs. It was large and, yes, in the shape of a cheeseburger.
"Thats for the dogs, kiddo."
"Is mine." Hayden hugged it to his chest. "I can has cheezburger."
"But it's a dog toy! It's not even a real cheeseburger! I'm making turkey burgers tonight. Wouldn't you rather have that?"
"CHEEZBURGER." Hayden said stubbornly. "I CAN HAS." He added, just to make sure Max had gotten the message.
"All right, all right." Max gave a big sigh. "You can have the squeaky toy."
Hayden gave a happy little purr and jumped back off the counter, clutching the plastic burger as if it were made of gold. "C'mon, fud. Lets go an' play. I'll teach you to play princess in another castle." The cheeseburger squeaked in agreement.
Max was just glad the kid hadn't found the catnip he'd bought for the barn cats.
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Posted: Wed Jul 15, 2009 5:03 pm
.:My half, Your half:.
There was a line down the middle of the room. Originally it had been drawn in chalk, down the center of the floor and then up the walls as far as a tiny tailed wonder could reach by standing on the kiddie sized chair. The chalked line had been overlayed by silver duct tape. The silver duct tape was now covered in tiny partial pawprints in a variety of colors.
The two halves of the room were as different as it's two occupants who, despite everything, managed to get along quite well. Darsh, their big brother, had moved up into the attic to his very own room leaving the small but mobile Hayden and the smaller but vocal Warren to fight it out on their own.
And thus Warren had instructed his little brother (sequentially, at least) to divide the room in half with the door in the middle. Effectively this left each of them with a window, as well.
Warren's half of the room was bare, a few pieces of wire and cable sitting on the wooden floor. Though around his crib was a massive pile of stuff. Like a dragon's hoarde. His shinies.
Hayden's half of the room was messy. There was a roughly shaped square painted on the ceiling that the Hiccup sometimes sat and stared at in rapt concentration. There were squeaky toys littering the floor, mostly ones stolen from the dogs, and awkward chalk drawings that looked like some sort of weird battle plans with Xes and Os.
The hiccup was currently sitting at the tape line, sucking on his plastic squeaky hamburger toy and watching the cyclops. It was fascinating, Warren would look at something and then it would move.
"How does you do that?" Hayden asked.
I just do it. Warren's infantile vocal cords weren't developed enough for him to speak. Luckily he was able to communicate in weak telepathy. Even better, given Hayden's feline roots it was much easier to talk to him. The two could even have conversations, though Warren's cognitive skills were well above those of his brother's. It's called Telekinesis. Moving things with your mind.
"I can has?"
No, I don't think so. I'm fairly sure you cannot. Warren scowled at his little brother. Not that it meant much... Warren was always scowling. None of the family thought he was capable of anything other than a stormy expression.
"But..." The Lolcat's lower lip quivered dramatically.
But you can do other things. You can go and get me some more batteries from downstairs. It was amazing, Warren mused, how easily he could manipulate Hayden into doing what he wanted. Like fetching things for him. With his squishy non-functioning clunky body it was impossible for the Interplanetary Criminal to get around the house without someone carrying him.
"I can gets battrys." Hayden nodded. "Bak soon." He skipped towards the door, tail flicking, the squeaky cheeseburger clamped firmly in his little claws.
The only problem about sending Hayden on an errand, Warren thought irritably, was that he had a cat's sense of timing as well. Which meant he may or may not come back and he may or may not have bothered to get the batteries.
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Posted: Wed Jul 15, 2009 5:17 pm
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Posted: Thu Jul 16, 2009 1:23 pm
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Posted: Thu Jul 16, 2009 3:42 pm
.:Idol Worship:.
"We have a problem." Max looked perplexed. His sister looked up at him and blinked.
"Whats wrong?" Emma asked. Max didn't usually look so... confused about things.
"Have you looked in the bathtub lately?"
"Nooo..."
"Theres a pile of dead spiders."
"What?"
"Also, we're out of toilet paper."
"I just bought some last week..."
"I know. It's also in the bathtub. With the spiders."
"Max, what on earth..."
"Hayden. It's Hayden." Max let out a great sigh and flopped down onto a chair. "Did you know he has apparently began to attempt to cut holes in his ceiling?"
"I.. no." Emma rarely paid attention to the world around her.
"I asked him about it." Max drew a deep breath, irritated resignation warring with amusement.
"And?"
"And apparently the cat deity lives in the ceiling."
"Oh. Wait, what?"
"Yes. And the spiders were offerings to his god."
"And the toilet paper?"
"Dunno." Max's eye twitched. "Emma, do we have a religious fanatic on our hands?"
Emma thought about this for a moment. "We've had cats before, Max. They always leave dead things in the bathtub. And they always eat the toilet paper."
"Yeah, but Hayden..."
"Is a huge cat. Boy. Catboy." Emma giggled the giggle of the perpetually stoned.
"But then.."
"Be glad he hasn't brought us a cow."
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Posted: Fri Jan 22, 2010 10:57 pm
.:Faith and Feer:.
Hayden's tail twitched in concentration as he perched on the roof of one of the dog houses. His plastic squeaky cheeseburger was clutched in one hand - the lolcat took the thing everywhere, despite the fact that it was covered in tooth marks. Emma reassured Max that baby animals liked to chew on things and really there could be no harm in Hayden having a sqeak toy.
"It's not that he has a sqeak toy!" Max had said, exasperated. "It's that he talks to it!"
"Hayden talks to everything." Emma had replied with a serene smile. "And he calls nearly everything food. Chill out, bro."
That had been the end of the great cheeseburger debate and the catboy had been permitted to keep his friend. He gave it a little squeeze and it let out an indignant squeak.
"See, fud..." He said to the toy under his breath. "Teh dogs. They are plottings sumtings." The dogs were, in fact, mostly napping under the trees. "They never stops their plottings. But they is not gud at it. I show you reel plots." With a grin, Hayden leapt effortlessly from the roof of the doghouse to the fence rail and, clutching the cheeseburger in his mouth, walked along the railing until he came to the chicken coop.
"Now dis is where they grow moar fud." He grinned and squeaked his toy. "An teh little fud, it comes out of those round things. An den it gets big." The hens in the yard were clucking nervously. They had learned that having Hayden nearby was never a good idea. "Now, we is gunna take sum of teh round things and hide them in our room. Then, when dey open up, teh little fud will think we are it's mommy!" This rather diabolical and half-brained scheme seemed to please the little cat immensly. The cheeseburger squeaked in seeming agreement. Maybe it was just anxious for Hayden to have something else to chew on.
He had begun the process of stealthily creeping up on one of the chickens when a loud shout interrupted his concentration.
"Haaayden! Where are you?"
"Dratz. Foiled again." Hayden muttered under his breath, shoving his toy in a pocket and slinking towards the house where Max was searching for him. "Am here, dad. Dont get yur underwearz in a knot."
Max raised his eyebrow at the comment, but decided he'd rather not know who exactly was teaching his youngest child such language. "Hayden, I need help bringing some boxes up from the cellar. Darsh is in town, so will you help me?"
Hayden's eyes got large as saucers as soon as Max mentioned the cellar. "I cant go down there, dad! Teh basement cat is down there!"
"Basement cat?" Max asked, perplexed.
"Yah. Ceiling cat lives in ceiling. Basement cat lives in basement. Theirs is a battle of good an evil to end all battles of good an evil."
Max blinked. "And you're afraid of this cat you think is in the basement?"
Hayden's hackles rose, the fur on his neck standing up. "I's not afraid of anythingz! Not even dark ol' basement cat. Not even when he rises from the abyss an' swallows teh whole world!"
Max sighed again. Too many late night horror films, perhaps. But where on earth had Hayden gotten the idea of these cat deities? It made no sense. This could not possibly be what real cats thought about, could it? "Remind me when we're done that I want to show you some books about Egypt." He wasn't sure that teaching Hayden about ancient cat worship was a good idea, but at least it might distract him from his household deities. Bast would be much more suitable if the boy insisted on worshipping something, Max decided.
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Posted: Sat Jan 23, 2010 9:37 am
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