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 Posted: Sat Nov 26, 2011 8:15 pm
Merci stretched her arms over her head and heaved a satisfied sigh. It had been a slow day in Twilight designs. She'd managed to get a ton of stuff done, and still had time to touch up her manicure. The kitsune was perched on a stool behind the counter, her legs crossed and her tail twitching lazily behind her. The last few minutes of a shift always seemed to tick by so slowly!
Dio was lounging next to the doorway. He was trying to finish a new display for the front window. He was getting excited by the fact Christmas was going to be soon. It was one of his favorite times of year. For some reason he was feeling optimistic about this season. Maybe all the plans he'd tried to make in years gone by would have a chance this year. 'You seem so restless lately. Is it because your date is getting closer?' His burgundy eye moved up from the jewelry boxes he was arranging.
The guardian just shot her boy a look. "I have a lot of planning to do. I work a lot, in case you didn't notice. Between the few shifts I get here, I happen to do a crap ton of paperwork for the Plume. I've never had to set up a wedding before. I'm starting to think that people who do it are crazy, and to tell Cinder we should just keep living in sin." Merci stood up and leaned her elbows on the counter, "Anyway, I'm not worked up. I'm just watching the clock. Everyone whose ever had a job anywhere, watches the clock." Her ears were half cocked, and she had her emerald gaze locked on the teenager.
The fiend just gave the mental impression of a snort. It wasn't really possible for him to do, as he didn't actually have a nose. 'I think you're plenty worked up. It's not like I don't know you, we've been bonded for years now.' He paused a moment and turned back to his work quickly. The glare that Merci had shot him had made him giggle in the back of his mind. It was way to fun to push her buttons.
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Posted: Sun Nov 27, 2011 3:23 am
Miranda had been scheduled to take over for today’s afternoon, but the minutes to the end of Merci’s shift ticked by and then some – still no Miranda in sight.
Then, about ten minutes late, the door was flung open, the bells jingling madly in a discordant crescendo. “Oh my God, I’m so, so sorry I’m late!” Miranda blurted first thing, seemingly quite out of breath. Her face was flushed red, and she looked rather disheveled – it was obvious she must have run at least part of the way. “I would have called, but …” She clung to the door frame, trying to catch her breath some before she finished her sentence. “I forgot my cell at home in the rush,” she ended sheepishly.
“Rutie, will you please come in?” she shouted over her shoulder, holding the door for the young fiend. She didn’t need to, she knew, but closing the door shut right into someone’s face just wasn’t nice, even if they could phase right through it. “It’s getting cold in here. You can play with those leaves later.”
“I’m really sorry,” Miranda continued to babble, her tone apologetic, as she knocked the dirt off her boots on the door mat. “It’s just, I haven’t gotten a good night’s sleep in a long while, so I took a nap, and then I didn’t hear the alarm because a certain someone decided to play with it in the meanwhile.” She glared over her shoulder. “And then of course this led to that, and I ended up missing the tram. Rutie?”
There was a gust of wind as the shadow moved through the open door, dry leaves blown in in its wake and golden shimmering … sparkles?
Miranda looked at the leaves with an expression of someone resigning to their fate upon her face. “I’ll clean that up first thing,” she promised. “As soon as I’ve made myself presentable. Wont take long, I promise.”
Rutie moved along the corners of the room, where it was darkest, next to invisible as he hid in the shadows – if it hadn’t been for the occasional tiny whirlwind of golden sparks popping up here and there, giving away his position.
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Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2011 12:32 am
The teenager couldn't help a cheerful glint to his eye as he smoothly interjected. 'Don't worry. We didn't have anywhere we desperately needed to be. Sometimes you just have things that aren't totally in your control right?' He glanced toward his guardian and then floated over to Miranda. In the low light, the pinpricks of light that seemed to shine from under his skin seemed more prominent. Dio offered the out of breath woman a hand with her jacket, 'It was pretty slow today anyway.' He was being very nice actually, and he was using his empathy to try and soothe Miranda's flustered demeanor.
Merci watched her charge and she didn't interject right away. He'd been right, she was feeling a bit stressed from the wedding arrangements. It was probably what had her on edge lately. She could also feel the barest hint of the calming emotions Dio was flooding into the room.
He was getting entirely too good at that.
Her green eyes moved from the discombobulated woman, to the fiend that accompanied her. "Congratulations! Now comes the fun part." She couldn't help the smirk that accompanied that comment. "Now he's old enough to talk back." Merci's tone was teasing, but she really did mean it. The older they got, the more confusing they seemed to get too.
Dio glanced past Miranda to Rutie and his eye got wider. 'My goodness I didn't even,' He paused and then started over, 'Yes congratulations, and hello!' He directed that last at the new fiend. He loved wisps, but he was always so happy to see when one had a good home. After all wasn't the point of all this to give them a second chance?
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Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2011 8:31 am
“More often than not lately, it seems,” Miranda muttered, gladly accepting Dio’s help with her jacket. “Hey, you’re quite the gentleman, aren’t you?” She said and winked. “And the shops likely going to pick up some during the afternoon, as people get off work. It usually does. The morning shifts are more quiet, but I’ve got a really hard time getting up in time for these, due to a certain someone.” She made a face, and slightly canted her head into Rutie’s direction. She knew exactly where he was.
“You tell me,” Miranda groaned. “Not like he’s talking back at me, but he’s got hands now. I really do wish I’d never shown him how to use a screwdriver. He killed my toaster.”
‘I fix it~!’ Rutie happily declared, eventually showing up behind the counter.
“It was never broken in the first place!” Miranda snapped. “Now it’s turned into an at least 100 piece 3d puzzle!”
Rutie’s shoulders hunched, and he managed to pull off remarkably well the image of a poor, unhappy beaten puppy. ‘I make it better. But, first, I need to figure out how it work,’ he explained seriously. ‘Take it apart to figure out.’
“Yeah, ‘take it apart’ you did.” Miranda rolled her eyes in mock despair. It was striking how they were just the exact same shade of warm brown as Rutie’s. She took off her boots and stepped into the pumps instead she’d retracted from her bag. “Will be right back,” she muttered, heading for the back room.
Rutie followed her with his gaze, but didn’t quite dare to follow her for real. This felt … a lot like his guardian was heading for the bathroom, and she had made it adamantly clear he was not allowed to follow her there.
‘Hello,’ he returned Dio’s greeting instead, fidgeting some with his goggles. ‘Look,’ he said, pulling them down to cover his eyes. ‘Mir got them for me.’ He thought they were quite awesome.
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Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2011 8:58 am
Merci couldn't help but chuckle a little bit at Miranda's obvious consternation. She reclined back on her stool and turned her green eyes onto Rutie, "You like to take things apart and put them back together? Perhaps I should introduce you to my partner and our son. They are quite the mechanics, I'm sure you'd get along famously." Though she was certain that Cinder would probably want to keep him away from the important things. Like, the Warhammer and the hover bikes. Losing those would be pretty tragic.
The teenager easily cruised through the air and hung Miranda's jacket up for her. It was getting a bit chilly outside, and he was certain she'd probably want it for her trip home later. It always seemed to be colder when it got darker. 'Your goggles are pretty fantastic. If you're going to take things apart it's smart to wear them. Wouldn't want to have something fly off and hurt you.' His tone was playful, and just seemed to ooze with his obvious happiness.
Dio's multicolored tail twitched lazily behind him, the sparkles that seemed to come from within him caught on the artificial lights and twinkled. 'You know, I think your guardian would be relieved if we cleaned up that mess.' He gestured toward the doorway, and the leaves that still rested where they'd been blown.
The kitsune's ears perked up toward Dio and she scowled at him a bit. "I see, thoughtful today aren't we?" He wouldn't have gone out of his way for her. She'd always thought that she'd had it easy with her black star. He wasn't a huge trouble maker, he didn't pick fights, he didn't usually break things. It seemed however that he was a pain in the a** in completely different areas. He just liked to push her buttons to get a rise out of her. She wasn't going to take the bait today.
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Posted: Tue Nov 29, 2011 7:21 am
‘Take them apart, yes.’ Rutie nodded enthusiastically. ‘Put back together – mmmh, tried, but …’ He nervously tugged at his goggles, and then shrugged, giving Merci a slightly sheepish yet disarmingly innocent look through the tinted glasses. ‘Make it a better toaster once I figure out.’
Shoving the goggles back up to serve as a geeky hairband of sorts for his dreads he hurried to join Dio before Merci could ask any more uncomfortable questions. He really had tried fixing the toaster back up before Miranda could wake up, but always ended up with extra parts that seemed to have no place left over to fit in. In the end it had been his growing distress about his continued failures which had woken Miranda, and she had been acting rather grumpy towards him ever since. Maybe he should give it another try, with glue this time. Miranda had lots of glues …
‘Clean, must I?’ The little fiend didn’t seem too happy about it, but he obediently started to gather up the leaves one by one. It had been much more fun chasing the dry leaves blown about by the wind outside, and diving head-on into the rustly heaps. He looked at the bundle he’d collected already, face thoughtful, and then tossed them up into the air, following them with a little back flip of his own, causing a small shower of golden sparkles to rain down along with the leaves. ‘Wheeeh~!’
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Posted: Fri Dec 02, 2011 1:41 am
Merci covered her mouth to keep from cackling out loud, and failed miserably. It was wonderful seeing how happy Rutie was, but over and above that, it was great seeing Dio's expression. This was what revenge was like, "Is it fun being an older brother Dio?" Her voice was sweet as pie, but her smile was all cat's got the cream.
The teenager glanced at Merci and he probably would have flipped her off if Rutie hadn't been there. He didn't really want the younger fiend to learn that and do it to Miranda. It would raise awkward questions of where he learned it. 'He's having fun and we're off shift. Technically Miranda would have to clean all this up. I just thought we'd be nice and make her day easier by doing it for her.' His wine colored eye moved back over to the golden fiend. 'You like to make things easier for your guardian right?' The black fiend moved off behind the counter and picked up a broom. Even though he was old enough that he could form legs, he still preferred to float around. He denied it, but it might have had something to do with the fact that his multicolored tail, turned into multicolored feet.
The kitsune's tail continued to flick back and forth and she kept the smirk on her face. Though there was a part of her that was proud of Dio. She didn't know how, but he seemed to have developed patience at some point. It was novel, and she was enjoying the two fiends interactions.
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Posted: Fri Dec 02, 2011 8:00 am
Rutie blinked at Dio almost owlishly, before he reluctantly replied: ‘No …?’ After a moment’s thought, though, the child fiend seemed to reconsider. ‘Maintenance. Make better. I fix it.’ He reached out to take the broom from Dio’s hands, albeit he didn’t have the slightest clue as to how to use it. It didn’t matter, as he was distracted by Dio’s fabulously sparkly and colorful tail almost immediately anyway. ‘M16, Eagle Nebula,’ he said. ‘Constellation: Serpens. Type: Emission. Distance: 7000 light years. Age: 5.5 million years.’ He looked up at Dio, his brown eyes filled with wonder. ‘Coordinates: 18h 18m 48s, −13° 49′ 00″’ He hesitated, as if about to add something else, but then the bright light of excitement in his eyes died down, and he dropped his longingly outstretched hands. ‘Hyperspace gate …’ He looked at Dio, as if he was expecting some sort of reply or explanation from the older fiend, and then shook his head with confusion when he received none. ‘Clean, I will,’ he resigned to his fate, taking the broom from Dio’s hands.
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Posted: Mon Dec 05, 2011 7:56 am
Merci's giggle kinda died in her throat and her delicate eyebrow shot up to her hairline. Something inside her groaned, and she knew whatever plans she'd had for that evening would probably have to be cancelled. Then she sighed. She'd have to give Cinder a call and see if they could eat out tonight. Dio was going to be deep in discussion for hours probably. What the hell were the chances there would be another fiend who was that much of a geek?
The teenager's eye widened and he looked at Rutie with what could only be surprised excitement. Dio's arm shot out and he grabbed the broom and pulled it away from Rutie. He was just giddy when he held out his left arm, and he pointed out a constellation of stars. 'Do you know what this one is?' He couldn't keep the edge of excitement out of his voice when he asked. It was more then he'd hoped for! He'd never been able to talk about these sorts of things with anyone except Tariq.
The kitsune was a bit happy that her boy was grown up enough she didn't have to stay by his side all the time. It meant that she could slip out and meet her lover somewhere else. "Dio, don't get sidetracked. You were going to clean the floor remember?" Her tone was resigned. She could probably just leave him down here. It wasn't as if the black star didn't know his way home, but she'd feel guilty abandoning him. Especially since she'd drug him out to begin with today.
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Posted: Mon Dec 26, 2011 1:40 pm
Rutie blinked perplexed when the broom was taken from his hands. First clean, now no clean, what? He fidgeted with his goggles for a moment, as he apparently always did when he was nervous or unsure as to what to do.
He then peeked at Dio's arm with open curiosity, trailing the constellation he had pointed out with the tip of his finger. It left a trail of faint golden sparkles outlining the constellation before they faded. 'Stars,' he said. 'I don't know. Before, just now, it was all in my head. But now it's all gone away.' The little fiend's mental voice was tinged with a sense of loss and confusion.
“Did I just miss something?” Miranda asked, stepping back into the storefront. She looked significantly less disheveled, and was carrying two cups of tea. If Merci didn't like any, why, then she'd just drink both~! “Rutie seemed really excited about something just now.”
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