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...the one in which Shadow writes her thoughts...

I can't believe this.

A strawberry mutant invades my home, steals my food, sleeps in my shoe and generally makes havoc, and it has now destroyed my local ice-rink. Plus, it's terrified of the computer so I can't watch Bleach with it in the 100-mile vicinity. I'm deprived!

Worse still, I don't know what it is or how long it's staying. If it stays any longer, I could have problems. I can't take it to school. I definitely can't take it to school. If I just took my eyes off it for one moment...who knows what damage it would wreak? It might even burn the school down!
...Actually, that wouldn't be a bad thing.

But anyway! Am trying to do homework and it keeps buzzing round me and annoying me. It still can't talk in any language I recognise, but I think it understands me a bit better if I talk slowly and not about Bleach. Which, dear diary, is AWESOME. Just have to make a note of that. Yes.

Oh damn. I hear crashing in the kitchen. Gotta go.

-Shadow, 18/11/05

...the one in which Shadow is tired...

The door creaked open, and eased closed.

A dark, shambling figure wearily made its way to the table, where it promptly collapsed in a chair. Behind it, sparkling and bouncing happily, was a shiningly sunny Ichigo.

Shadow was exhausted, to put it lightly. She'd been running round most of the day retrieving said pet and keeping it out of harms way - (i.e, the food blender, the Yr13's hockey practice and the Technology practical workshops) - and when she wasn't rescuing it, she was comforting it from the loud noise and the scary moving computer and television things, which Ichigo still wasn't used too.
But now it seemed her pet had decided that its adventures that day were actually quite exciting, and it was relishing its new experiences. Shadow just wanted to whack it one and tell it to calm down, but she had a vague feeling that constituted as pet abuse.

"Naa..." She began, her head flat on the table. "Ichigo..."

Her flying strawberry chirped.

"D'you mind...keeping it down a bit?" Shadow said, still not moving. "The light's really starting to get to me...and I've got sore eyes..."

The strawberry seemed to consider it, then chirped irritatingly and shook itself complacently.

Despite what she'd thought earlier, Shadow found herself sticking one fist out and encasing the strawberry in a death-grip. "Light. down. please."

Ichigo quivered and cheeped in shock, and then fright, but sulkily dimmed the sunlight it was emitting. Shadow sighed, and loosened her grip a bit.

"Look, we've gotta work this out somehow." She said hopefully, twisting her head onto it's side so that one eye's gaze was now resting on Ichigo. "I'm not too fond...I don't really like," She corrected, seeing her puff's confusion. "Sunlight...and you keep shining everywhere...and I'm taking it that you don't like the computer...y'know, the moving capturing box," She added. "Which is was I -have- to go on...whether just to surf the net or to do my homework. D'you understand?"

Ichigo nodded slowly, then shook it's head.

Shadow sighed.

"Right. First thing's first. You're learning English. I don't care what sort of Puff-nese you speak - which reminds me that I still need to find out what you are - you're gonna learn good ol' English. Y'hear?"

Ichigo nodded uncertainly.

"Good." Shadow plopped her puff unceremoniously down on the table, grabbed a pen and a couple of sheets of scrap paper, and began writing. "A. This is an "ay" sound..."

----

Four hours and several sheets of paper later, Shadow was even more tired, but strangely triumphant. Her Ichigo could now read and understand a small, uncomplicated extract of Harry Potter - which in Shadow's mind was one of the only reasons for learning how to read - and could understand Shadow when she talked, as long as it was slowly and not the Japanglish that Shadow spoke whenever she talked about Bleach.

It was a start.

...the one in which more time passes...

"Ichiiigooo! Ichi- Oww!"

Shadow felt rather than saw the little monster collide with her head and sighed. Since gaining a basic knowledge of Wethkin a few days ago, she'd come to the conclusion that the less she knew, the better. Her brain had already started to spin at Alanna's explanations, but those coupled with Ichigo's half-formed, often incomplete-because-the-Wethkin-got-distracted-by-something-shiny statements were not only confusing, they were exhausting.

So for now, she had determined to ignore the whole thing. Lock the information away in her brain where she wouldn't think about it until she knew the -whole- story...and that wasn't going to be found any time soon. She was too busy, what with Christmas preperations and last minute gifts, finding lost things -- or at least, trying to find -- drawing, eating, sleeping, that really, only the most primitive of functions made it to her brain these days.

Currently, she was trying to decorate the Christmas tree. It was Ichigo's first Christmas, and naturally the Wethkin was a -little- over-excited. It had listened solemnly as she'd explained the holiday, and expanded to include the religious history and background that her family celebrated, but it was when she'd got the food-and-present-giving part that the Wethkin had really showed signs of interest. Over-interest, in fact.

And now she was being half-strangled with the tinsel as an enthusiastic Ichigo wrapped it round her. It understood the -theory- behind tinsel well, but had mistaken what it was meant to wrap the shiny stuff round.

"Ichigo- oww! I'm not a Christmas tree - oww, oww, stop!"

Ichigo froze. So did Shadow. Then, as one, they turned.

CRASH.

"OWWW!"

"MMREEE!"

The Christmas tree had come crashing down on top of them, throwing the two to the floor. Shadow, nursing a throughing scratched arm, scrambled out from under it and shoved it upright again, attempting to lean it against the wall. A rather squished-looking, sorrowful Ichigo wavered unsteadily from the floor, and without its usual vigour came to hover next to her ear.

"Right." Shadow said firmly. "Take this." She handed Ichigo one end and directed the strawberry-like puff to fly to the top tree. The Wethkin nestled in the branches, tucking the tinsel safely in a gap of pine while
Shadow walked slowly round and round the tree, draping the branches with sparkly streams.

The decorations were easier, the chocolate tree decorations not-so. Ichigo -still- had a habit of eating them before they reached the tree, and Shadow didn't have the heart to tell the Wethkin off, especially as she was often guilty of the same thing.

But eventually, it was finished. The tree stood in all its splendour, candles glowing brightly against the dark winter backdrop through the window.
Shadow arranged the few presents under the tree nicely into piles, and sat back, tired but pleased. Ichigo hovered by her ear and meeped happily as the last brightly-wrapped package was pulled neatly into place.

Shadow laughed at her puff's enthusiasm. "Only twenty-four days to go!"

...the one in which Shadow loses all sanity...

It was actually a few days later that Shadow fulfilled her promise, but even Ichigo could see that it wasn't her fault this time. But now, finally, after seven train journeys (Shadow got a bit lost on the changeovers) and a winding walk, they'd arrived outside the large, clean building that was the Wethkin Headquarters.
Even Ichigo was looking less certain of itself now that they were actually there, and hesitated.

Shadow nudged it ahead, not at all keen to walk into the strange building first. "Go on then. You were so anxious to be here, you might as well make the most of it."

Ichigo mreeped, and abandoning its pride altogether, zoomed to snuggle in the tangle of Shadow's hair.

"Urf," Shadow muttered, rolling her eyes. Cautiously, she approached the edifice and made her way up the sloping steps to the top. She could see people of all shapes and sizes milling about behind the door, and gulped. Crowds had never been her strong point. "Idiot."

"Mree," Squeaked Ichigo, quite unrepentant. Shadow pushed against the glass door, and entered.

It was dark and cool inside, and at once Shadow saw what she was looking for: a stack of free books that looked as if they contained the contents of an Encyclopedia - a Wethkin one. She grabbed a couple and stashed them in her bag, by now quite ready to leave. Ichigo was shivering in her hair and Shadow was not fareing much better, so it was with quite obvious relief that they found themselves back outside.

A long, but slightly less convoluted journey home, brought them back to Shadow's living room, where Ichigo promptly dropped like a stone onto the couch, Shadow following mere seconds later.

Comfortable and warm, Shadow unzipped her bag and brought out the first book. "'Wethkin and Spritkin'," She read. "'a fascinating look at the bonds between humans and their respective Wethkin. Delve deep into the mysterys of Wethkin geneology and discover where and what the Spritkin are.' Hnn," She raised an eyebrow. "Sounds...interesting. What on earth are Spritkin?"

It was at this point, that Ichigo emitted a loud "Mreee!" and scurried to its favourite hiding spot at the side of Shadow's neck.
Three multicoloured blobs had risen from the open mouth of Shadow's backpack and were now bouncing on the cushions. Shadow's eyes grew wider, and wider.

"We've picked up someone else's Wethkin!" Shadow's voice was frantic. "We'll be like, sued, for...abduction and robbery! What do we do??"

Ichigo shook it's head, at loss for words. The biggest purple blob studied them for a moment and then zoomed to head height.

"Muuu," It said solemnly. "Mryuuu. Buuu."

Shadow stared.

The other two followed suit, zipping up and round the bigger one. One Shadow could tell was still an egg, the other reminded her of a lost puppy. Neither seemed inclined to speak, however.

Shadow found her voice. "...Save me."

...the one in which more things happen, and Shadow finds out that silence is /not/ golden...

It was by now several weeks later, but Shadow hadn't had a chance to even -think- about cataloguing her Wethkin events. There were several memorable ones, including the one where Ichigo helped her rescue a bunny, which she now kept in her back garden, and the one where Ichigo had strayed a -little- too close to a firework at a wedding celebration, and now had a slightly singed tendril, and not forgetting the one where Ichigo -insisted- on going to the Victoria and Albert museum with Shadow on a school trip, and ended up getting stuck in an urn for three hours while Shadow ran herself ragged trying to find the puff. (But it all turned out fine in the end, Shadow accidentally dropped her notebook in the same urn, and on hearing the insulted 'Mree!' that followed, fished out both notebook at Wethkin with great haste. This attracted a few strange glances from the museum staff, who clearly thought that Shadow was mad, though perhaps this was due to the fact that she seemed to be telling off air.)

The last week in particular had gone past in a sort of mad rush -- Shadow had been frantically tearing up pieces of paper, doing strange scribbles on paper, and muttering to herself, which was what she called 'revising', and Ichigo called 'silly and a waste of time'. Well, actually, Ichigo called it 'mreeeep', but it probably meant something like that in translation.

Somehow she'd got through her exams, mainly by help of an invisible Wethkin hovering at her head making prompting 'meeeps' whenever she stopped writing on her answer paper. At least, Shadow reflected, they'd have a lot of material to extract the answer from, and she secretly hoped that maybe they'd give up trying to read through a combination of illegible scrawl and some Bleach doodles that had mysteriously appeared and just assume it was right. Maybe.

And now she was on holiday, in the sense that she wasn't actually on -holiday-, but she wasn't at school, which was a relief. But on the other hand, Ichigo took holidays to mean that 'owner-now-has-time-to-wait-on-me-all-the-time', so perhaps it wasn't really so much of a relief as she'd thought. The upside was that she would almost /enjoy/ going back to school.

Today Shadow had been playing the coveted Kingdom Hearts 2 in her room for most of the morning, accompianied by a solemn Zephyr in a wonderful moment of blissful silence save for the various yellings and blips of the game. Saurabh sat on Shadow's bed, for once not following Ichigo or Shinsei. Ever since seeing the start of the game, Saurabh had taken it upon itself to be a sort of Naminé, and was doodling quietly on a few sheets of scrap paper. All was calm.

The thing with owning three Spritkin and a Wethkin though was that moments of calm like these only served to make Shadow very nervous. It was when things were quietest, that things went wrong the worst. Distracted from her game by these thoughts, she hit the pause button and, followed by the ever-grave Zephyr, made her way downstairs.

Silence reigned almost eerily throughout the house. Shadow proceeded through the rooms with great care, pausing to see if she could identify any meeps or sounds that could point to the direction of any possibly trapped weather sprites.

Still nothing. Shadow crept through the kitchen and into the extension, fearing possible abduction or even worse, like perhaps the neighbour's cat had got in and eaten them, or they'd been squished by some falling books, or even that--

SPLAT.

Shadow's imaginative train of thought was cut off rather abruptly as something very large, very wet and very icky landed on her head. She raised a hand to her hair, grimacing as she made contact with the wet...substance.
She took a deep breath.

"ICHIGOOOO!!!!!!! I'M GOING TO KILL YOU!"

...the one in which Zephyr hatches...

It was a very docile and sorrowful-looking Ichigo that was let out three hours later. The Wethkin had spent much of the time, plotting revenge, but of course, Shadow wasn't to know that. The puff instantly busied itself being helpful and contrite in every way, so as not to draw unwanted attention [and punishments] to itself. However, this backfired rather, as merely the act of Ichigo being helpful was enough to put Shadow on her guard.

It was now four days later, and a rather desolate Shadow was enjoying her last few days of freedom, before the evils of schoolwork ate her up again. She was now tackling the mountain of homework that had been carefully shoved under her bed and conveniently forgotten about at the beginning of the holidays, and was not finding it an easy task at all, especially as she kept getting distracted.

"So...Inside, is the theme." Shadow said, staring blankly at the equally blank piece of paper. "God, I have NO idea how to do this."

Zephyr hovered beside her patiently. Ichigo was casting a helpful light over the pages of the book, illuminating a brilliantly white sheet. Saurabh was doodling quietly on a fresh sheet of paper, hoping to cheer Shadow up by drawing Roxas, Demyx and Axel from Kingdom Hearts II. Shinsei was, for once, not interesting in baiting Ichigo, and was watching Bleach on Shadow's Playstation on mute, so that the noise didn't tempt Shadow away.

"Art homework sucks," Shadow groaned for what felt like the millionth time that day. However many times she said it, though, it didn't make the work go away, nor did it make it any easier. And as she only had less than a week to complete it, she felt more pressure that she had done in weeks. "Why do I need to do this, anyway?" She moaned to a sympathetically placed Zephyr. "I passed my Spanish and Latin, I should get a medal or something. Instead, I get homework. Argh."

Zephyr listened as though he hadn't already heard this several times that day, which made Shadow feel vaguely better. She chanced a glance away from her paper towards the television and was rapped smartly on the knuckle by Ichigo, who seemed to be taking excessive amounts of pleasure in watching Shadow suffer. Sulking, Shadow turned her head back to her work when she heard an odd sound.

Blraurghk.

She blinked. "Excuse me?" She said, turning to Shinsei. "I'm working here, I said no distrac-"
But the puff was looking just as confused and worried as she was.
She scanned her desk. Ichigo, looking suprised, Saurabh, looking peaceful, Zephyr-

Shadow yelped.

The puff had exploded. Or...something. A gooey mess was ALL OVER her...future art homework...and was spreading merrily over her desk, regardless of the mayhem it was causing. Shadow gaped at it, then did the only thing she could think of -- grabbed her school bag and shoveled the Spritkin remains, goop and all, into it.

Now that the immediate threat to her desk was over, Shadow took a little time to examine the...gelly...substance. It hadn't stuck to her fingers, and it /glittered/ faintly. And right at the heart of it...

"Mreeeee," Said a voice in her ear. Ichigo fluttered beside her, looking both surprised and interested. "Mreee-ed," The puff added on thoughtfully, after looking at Shadow's confused face, as though that clarified matters.

As Mree could mean anything from 'explode' to 'I want more grapes', it didn't really help much. Shadow doubted anything Ichigo had to say on the subject was really useful anyway, since the thing that was sitting in the midst of the gloop was nothing neither she nor her Wethkin had ever seen before. "What?" She said distractedly, wondering if it was safe to poke.

"Mreeee!" Ichigo flapped frantically, thwacking her sharply with a tendril. "Mreeeephyr!"

"Mreephyr?" Shadow said, still eyeing the mess. "Wait, you mean...--!! That's Zephyr? B-but...it doesn't look anything like I'd imagined." She added lamely, reaching into her bag and scooping out the rather confused looking Spritkin puff. "And what's all this schmuck?"

"Mreeeee," Ichigo nodded. "Meeeeeeeep. Neeeemeep. Neeeee!" It zoomed towards Zephyr happily, poking the poor Spritkin like it was a new found toy.

Shadow sighed. Why did things always get so complicated?

...the one in which Shadow floats about in a tizzy...

The effects of her cousins' arrival and eventual departure had been, in Shadow's opinion, good ones.

All four puffs were now reverently quiet, because although most humans couldn't see them, it seemed children were a lot more magical than most, and could occasionally spot the floating sparkly things - if their eyes were drawn there by an errant squeak. The consequences of not letting the children play with them were as severe as letting them play with them: bawling, screeching, kicking and tantrums if they were denied, and squished, bruised, misshapen puffs if they were allowed.

All the puffs' well laid plans had gone wrong. Everytime Shadow was coerced into playing with the children by one of their ploys, Shadow inevitably sought them out, and with a gleeful grin, pointed out the "shiny bubbly puffs" to the delighted cousins. Who had been only too happy to play with them, rather than the big ugly grown girl.

As all good things do, however, the visit had finally come to an end. The days and the weeks had sped past, with the puffs finally becoming a little more rejeuvenated as time went on. And it was so gradual that Shadow didn't really notice either, but she was a little relieved. As much as she hadn't liked their fully hyperactive, dangerous natures, she had felt a little worried by how dispirited and boring they'd become.

Far too soon, 4th May was looming. The start day of Shadow's exams.

The puffs were unusually supportive.

They helped her revise, and lugged glasses of milk between them (with a few accidents) from the kitchen to her, didn't bother her or flap over her or distract her. The reason being that she was in such an annoying mood otherwise, that they couldn't stand her.

Ichigo, in particular, was crossing down the days on her exam timetable with gusto. The puff swore (in mreees) that it couldn't remember a time when she hadn't been like this.

The tension was rising in the house though, and none of the puffs could escape it. Shadow, always known for her impulsive, explosive mood swings, was now even more tempermental that usual, hiding from the light, cursing the rain, becoming irritable if even the smallest thing was out of place.

The puffs conferred together, waiting for the day all these evil exams were over and Shadow returned to vaguely normal.