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Elly was more than happy to stretch her legs after that bus ride. Machine transport is always so stuffy and uncomfortable and modern. She wishes her mom would have let her ride her moose in, but after arguing to no avail, she gave in and admitted that a Barton building wouldn't be comfortable for a moose, anyway. Still, she wasn't without guests. Her 'coon, looking particularly rabid today, is curled across her shoulders like a ragged, ugly scarf, her toad is somewhere in one of her pockets, and her platypus has her head sticking out of a baby backpack.

"Hello!" she shouts upon entrance. "Hi hi hi~!"

Her boots squeak with the melting snow as she skips down the entrance hallway, her tail swishing to and fro, opposing her head, which looks left to right to catch sight of anyone she can pester with her presence.

Elly gasps. "Costumes?" she breathes in what was probably her quietest voice. "Thank you, Reggie!"

She tosses her arms around him in a hit-and-run hug, and walks as quickly as she can without running - she's perfected this, from being scolded so many times for running indoors - toward the costumes.

The platypus makes a strange, friendly sound, almost a bark, at "Reggie" upon departure.

((Lind))

He really didn't know what this party was for. He didn't really know anyone there. And at the moment, he really didn't care much. Hey, it's open to the public, why not? It's not as if he had anything better to do. Like sleep. Sleep was overrated. Besides, it had been a while since he had been to a party. In the day time. With things like face painting and ring tosses and everything.

Trip down memory lane!

Also, trip into a pretty swank place. Not everywhere has a giant glass dome, you know. After he walked through the entrance he stood in front of the fountain, looking around absently. Well. This looks like it'll be....interesting.

Welcoming person! ...Welcoming...person? A look to the left, no. A glance to the right, no. Down? Yes. "Uhm...right! Thanks!" Small blue person welcoming people? Not so strange. Have seen strange. Just keep that in mind.

Face painting? Nah. Or at least not yet. Maybe later. Food? Definitely.

But oh. Ring toss. Can't pass that one up, can we? So with a stupid grin on his face, he shoved his hands into his pockets and made his way 'round the fountain to the right room. And lo! The shining bottles! The colorful rings! The possibilities that awaited at each toss! The chance to totally humiliate yourself!

"Hey! Can I join in on the fun?"

Well, one would hope he had more than three. That would just be terribly inefficient, wouldn't it? And so with a brief crack of his knuckles and a roll of his shoulders (it had been awhile, shut up), he took the rings, staring at the bottles for a moment before tossing the first of them.

Clang. Nope. Lind watched as the ring bounced off of the lip of one of the bottles, ricocheted off of another, and fell down between another two. Dang. Well. Two more tries, right?

And a no go yet again. The last ring was held in his hand for a contemplative moment, staring down the bottles as if they could be intimidated into just grabbing the ring out of the air.
And the third one....!

The third one did even worse than the other two. Today was just not his day, was it? Oh well. He can try again.
And mark his words.
He will.
No bottles have beaten him yet!

A guy in his late teens, dressed as if he'd walked out of some strange Ren faire meets steampunk event and wings large enough to use in flight, rushes in shortly after Elly has bounded away.

He looks to and fro, before turning to the toddler Archie. "Have you seen a girl, about yay high," he asks hurriedly, gesturing to about the end of ribcage, "rush past? Has a menagerie of animals with her? Uh, blonde, tail?"

Elly, in the meantime, is realizing that she has just walked into heaven. Clothes of all sorts, at her disposal. She lets out a squeal for a good two seconds before clasping her hands over her mouth. The raccoon around her shoulders squirms in agony.

"Hello!" she practically shouts, waving around her freckled arms as they're released from her mouth. "I'm here for dress up! Are you a hyena?! Look at my platypus!!"

She swings the baby backpack off so quickly that it makes the poor thing dizzy, and to make matters worse, Elly, in her excitement, sets it down with a good thud, followed by two more when she hits the floor with her knees. It is a very good thing that her bandages are on them today.

Garrett bows slightly to show his gratitude, then continues off in the direction he's been told his sister went.

"Everything here is for trying on?" Elly seems bewildered. Her mother never lets her touch her clothes, but most of what her mother wore, the girly girl wasn't interested in, anyway. But this! Some of these clothes look like things from picturebooks about princesses and knights!

Her platypus slides out of the backpack and waddles under a pile of clothes, and out of sight.

Elly picks up a hat with a giant feather on it, and places it atop her head. It stays erect against her pigtails, but droops in the front and sags in the back. She giggles, and twirls on the spot.

Parties, he was a sucker for them. Especially if there were games. The young alien moved about the room with all of the clothes in a calm fashion, a thoughtful expression on his pink face as he considered his future costume. This, Gage knew, was a veritable treasure trove of fun. There were so many options!

Smirking to himself, more excited about the opportunity to play dress up than perhaps any teenager who was actually a convicted criminal should have been, Gage plucked a grey trench coat off of a nearby hanger and slipped it over his slender frame. It was long and hung below his knees. The look of his jeans beneath the hem of the coat disagreed with Gage and, feeling playful, he tied the front of the jacket closed and then slipped off his pants. He still wore his boxers (a modest red pair with white polka-dots) and his blue t-shirt underneath, but both articles of clothing were completely hidden by his choice of costume. With his naked pink calves and ankles bared Gage looked, for all the world, like a flasher who liked to run around malls and scare helpless old ladies.

After a quick glance in the mirror Gage, thoroughly satisfied with his attire thus far, tossed his jeans unconcernedly onto a pile of flamboyantly coloured scarves and started rummaging around for a suitable hat.

Bastion sighed softly as he was literally pulled down an entrance way and into a large glass dome. With Orion tugging on one hand and Carina on the other he had very little choice about the pace they were keeping and where precisely they were going. Discipline was not yet something he'd instilled in the two children and Bastion found himself paying for it nearly every day. On the other hand at least agreeing to come to this event had the bonus of giving the pair something to wear themselves out with so he could hopefully spend after dinner making work calls without them flitting in and out of his study.

Neither curio nor herald were aware of their father's secret reasons behind agreeing to this trip. Of course neither would have cared if they had known either becuase both were just excited to be going to a place meant specifically for play, at least on this day anyways. Small wings fluttered and the black lines on Carina's skin shifted showing off the two toddlers excitement as they yanked, as much as ones their age could, their father around the dome and then into one of the rooms.

Bastion found himself staring at a very strange green skinned kid with hair in desperate need of a cut. He seemed to be minding a game of ring toss which Bastion though would be interesting, he doubted Carina or Orion had the co-ordination yet to win but he could hold them up and let them play anyways. " I'd like to give this a try" Bastion stated calmly while digging into his pocket for his wallet, he hoped he had enough money for this, the man wasn't used to needing to carry much cash around.

Lind looked at the rings with a rather grumpy look on his face, trying to will one of them onto the bottles through sheer force of will.
Nada. Nil. Zilch.
Oh darn.
"...Can I try again?" He had a brief notion that he was going to be stuck in here all day, unable to let himself leave until he won. Well. At least he wouldn't be doing anything harmful?

Right. Moving out of the way of the other person. Just polite and all. And might help, you never know. The first ring was taken from the stack and thrown...

Well. This was going to be rather pathetic if he kept on losing wasn't it? Of course, it probably was going to end that way. Maybe. Possibly. Toss number two!

This is very embarrassing. His manly honor was on the line. And he can't let that go down in flames.
If, you know, he had any. It was up for debate if he did. Depends on who's asking. And so, the third ring and his last hope (for this round) was released into the air.

There was a brief moment of silence as he stood and stared at the bottles. They were mocking him. That was it. They were making fun of him and his feeble ring-tossing attempts.
"...This is sad, isn't it?" he asked to the world at large, or possibly at Sid.

Hands in his pockets, Hoss strolled into the party. Anywhere there was free food was bound to at least be decent. He decided to ignore the food at first, however, in favor of exploring.

Hoss happened to walk into the ring toss room shortly after the boy before him apparenty failed at the game.

"Can I try?" There'd probably be some sort of prize, and he'd give it to Rusty if he won.

The little girl had yet to get to the dress up room, but she pranced around like a princess nonetheless, pulling her "babysitter" a little dwarf female along behind her. "If I gotta stay with you, you gotta win me something, Carmel ordered Jordan.

"Yeah, yeah," Jordan said, rolling her eyes. Her parents were there, somewhere, but the little chocolate scented pain in the a** had ran off, so she had no choice but to follow. The sound of things hitting the ground caught her ears and she pointed. "How about in there?" she asked.

"Okay, but you gotta win me something," Carmel bossed. "And carry me, I'm getting tired."

"You are not, you little lazybutt."

Hoss shrugged after his attempt. Oh well!

"Eh."

Jordan sighed as Carmel gave her a mixed glare pleading look, then stepped forward, reaching up... then getting on tip toe, to grab three of the hoops. "She wants something," she said as she took them from him and jabbed a thumb in Carmel's direction.

Carmel was looking up at Sid curiously. Finally she decided, quite rudely, "My big brother's stranger." As if that was something to brag about.

"You think?" Jordan asked her, glancing at Sid. "I mean, seriously, this guy's got an awesome amount of strange going on here. I think he beats Chris." Then tossed the first ring.

"All I got is a tail," Carmel complained. It was becoming obvious that strange was a good thing to these two. "And you got a beard. And are super short."

"I'm. A. Dwarf," Jordan said. "That's just normal for a dwarf, so I've got no strange." She tossed the next hoop.

"You're not any good at this," Carmel stated as Jordan tossed the third ring.

"You're not any good at encouragement."

"Yep, you suck," Carmel said. "Shoulda got a stool to stand on."

"Oh shut up, already," Jordan muttered irritably. Maybe she should ask for a stool next time, though... It was a thought.

Jordan patted him on the leg as she handed over the rings. "You, man, are the coolest thing I've seen all day. What's your name again?"

"Did you see that one girl when we came in??" Carmel asked Jordan, grabbing her hand. "She was dressed up! We should go get dressed up!"

"You're already dressed."

"Right??" Carmel said to him, happy that he agreed. "She can dress up like a knight for my pretty princess!"

"Yeah? And where's your pretty princess at?" Jordan drawled, earning a wrathful look.

"I. Am. A pretty princess!" Carmel told her, sounding remarkably like when Jordan claimed to be a dwarf.

Jordan sighed. "Ok, ok, so where are they, anyway?" she asked Sid.

On his way to the dress up room, Garrett spots the door for face painting, and comes to a stop. His curiosity brings him inside. Admittedly, it is because he remembers this sort of thing from last time, and how it attracted many of the fairer sex.

Meanwhile, Elly grabs more clothing, and tosses it on. A strange button up vest, a poofy sleeved shirt, and a grossly oversized pair of slacks complete this look of 17th century bard.. or .. something. She kicks off her boots with a hobble on each foot, getting rather hot very quickly.

"What do you think?" she asks no one in particular. She walks in a circle, holding up the pants by the belt loops.

Gage heard the question, spoken in a little girly voice from somewhere near his elbow, and turned to examine the source with a blank expression. The teenager considered Elly thoughtfully for a second or two, took in her wardrobe from head to toe, and then smiled.

"Very eye-catching," he proclaimed playfully, and then tugged at the the lapels of his boringly grey trenchcoat in a mockingly regal fashion, "but, mine's still better."

There was a charming, quiet confidence about the pink alien that was designed to feel friendly, rather than oppressive and cocky. Minus the shady past and mischievous (which, arguably, sometimes bordered on the dark and the dangerous) tendencies, Gage was an open book.

Or, at least, that's what he'd like you to think.

"Okay, fine," Jordan said. "We'll go to the dress up room. AFTER I try one more time," she added before Carmel could squeal in happiness.

"Get a stool this time!" Carmel said. "You're too short to do it right."

"Fine. Do you got a stool, or a chair or something?" Jordan asked Sid.

"Thanks," Jordan said as she climbed onto the chair. "And whatever we win, you gotta share, got it?"

"Nuh uh," Carmel said as Jordan threw the first ring. "This is payment for Miss Bunny!"

Jordan choked, then burst into laughter.

"Don't make me laugh when I'm throwing things!" Jordan complained as she wiped away a tear.

"That wasn't funny!" Carmel said. "It was rude!"

Jordan snickered, narrowing her eyes, her tongue sticking out as she aimed and tossed the next ring.