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 Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2010 11:50 am
A pumpkin patch wasn't exactly what Howl had had in mind when he had said he wanted some harvest time fun. He was not especially fond of corn mazes; nor did he appreciate it when witches were depicted as ugly, warty, green skinned old hags. He knew better. Still, Devin had insisted--and where he and Devin went, a certain shadow was sure to follow. Puff had attached himself to Howl's head, quite literally. He was sitting upon the wizard's shoulders and would tug at the boy's hair everytime a particularly frightening decoration was within his eyesight. "Puff," Howl sighed, "Could you refrain from pulling my hair out? I would prefer not to go bald prematurely... Or at all." His brother had run on ahead of them, looking for what he called a "lonely lookin' pumpkin". The signs boasted things like, "Haunted Cornmaze, guarenteed to scare!" and "Free Pumpkins to children!" Not too far away from said signs was another shadow. Oliver, if Howl remembered correctly. This was confirmed when the shadow turned to look at him, golden eyes shining playfully. "Oli?" the shadow said, making his way over to Howl. "Oli! Oli oli!" Clearly Oliver hadn't expected to run into someone he recognized. "Oliver, how did you end up here?" Oliver tilted his head and gave Howl a winning smile. "Oli?" he asked with a shrug.
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Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2010 12:03 pm
Where there was free or very cheap pumpkins, Azrael was sure to be there to get as many as he could. Since they never rotted somehow, he often tried to get enough to last through the year but unfortunately, his last batch vanished rather prematurely at around the beginning of summer. Still, the boy was determined to get enough this time around or at least keep his wish granting to a minimum.
And thankfully little miss prissy-pants wasn't around this time. Nope, he was on his own which really wasn't all that odd now that the little demon thought about it. "Heya Howl. Nice hat," Azrael commented casually, appearing out of what had to be thin air beside the wizard.
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Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2010 12:25 pm
"Smell my feet, give me something good to eat," sung a certain ragdoll child as she walked ahead of her mother. The dark elf was wary of the child at the moment because of a dark creature that clung to her daughter's back.
Ivy didn't know what to think of the shadow that Eve had come to call Herion, but she knew that her daughter had a handful with the jewal-loving creature.
Eve was getting used to Herion, but he seemed shy at the moment, making her think that it was best that she introduce him to some of the other shadows. Not Lilium though, the two shadows seemed to not get along with each other. One cheesy puff fight showed that much.
Said girl shadow followed them with her hand tightly held by her host, Anya. Anya was dressed the same as Ivy, all black with weapons hidden on her form.
Anya wondered if the kids would insist on making pumpkins light up. She hoped not since it would be her weapons for use of carving.
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Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2010 12:31 pm
Children are often excitable, this is true. And, when a number of them are gathered together, this gets to be unbearable. Especially if one of them is a shadow.
Four may not have seemed a large number to others with larger broods, but Kali hadn't given birth to any of the kids she was towing along today, and she was about ready to pop them all into sacs and ship them off to timbuktoo.
Dimitri was trying to play with Luka, but the little Shadow was far more interested in their sitter's fingers. Katia was trying to pull him off and keep him all to herself, and Kali's newest charge was gleefully jumping on Dimitri and knocking him over. The latter was Adam, a boy she was being paid to watch.
The rest? Well, they were family. And as soon as they were home, she'd show them what that meant. Particularily, with the toilet.
"Dimitri, let go of Luka, he's mine" Katia snapped, dislodging Luka from Kali's fingertips just as they walked into the pumpkin patch. Dimitri scowled, reaching for the Shadow.
"So? You're a stinky girl. He doesn't want to play with you."
"If you want to play with boys, play with Adam." Katia sniffed. "Luka and I are going into the corn maze."
"Ornge!" Adam interjected happily, pointing at a pumpkin.
Groaning, Kali rubbed her temple, shooting a deadly look at her siblings. They caught it and froze, Katia having the sense to take half a step back.
"Luka is not a toy, Dimitri you will be nice to girls, and Katia you will NOT wander off on your own!" She snapped at them, before turning to Adam, smiling as if she hadn't just shouted.
"Yes, Adam. Orange! It's called a pumpkin."
The Kovak kids were used to such 180 mood swings, but that didn't make them any less scary. They watched cautiously as Kali swung Adam up into her arms, giggling and walking further into the patch to find the perfect pumpkin for the baby beast. Adam didn't seem bothered by her yelling, and was cheering as she carried him in. A few moments later, Luka drifted after them, and Katia and Dimitri both followed.
"Hello Howl." Kali said as she carried Adam past him. Adam waved enthusiastically, before diving at a pumpkin. They were so big, and orange! He loved them! He wanted five, all to himself!
Kali laughed and set Adam down, watching as he lay against a particularily large one and rubbed his face on it. Apparently, he liked the color orange.
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Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2010 12:56 pm
Howl turned to stare at Azrael; it did his pride good not to have jumped. "Hey Azzy," he said, giving the other boy a smile. "Getting pumpkins?" he guessed. What else would someone come to a pumpkin patch for? "This is Puff," he added, grinning. The shadow in question didn't seem to have liked being called a hat.
"Pu! Uff!" Puff complained, shaking his finger at Azrael. Then he noticed something. "Ooooh," he said, reaching for the boy's hair. It was much prettier than Howl's! He wanted that instead! "Pu?" he asked hopefully.
Howl rolled his eyes. "He likes your hair," he translated for the pumpkin demon. He pried the shadow off of his shoulders and set him down. "Go pick out a pumpkin," he said. He turned to smile at Kali.
Beautiful as ever. "Hi Kali," he said, trying to appear casual. Unfortunately for him, what might have been a promising conversation was short lived. And by short lived, he meant Devin had ruined his chances. As soon as Adam had been sat down, the toddler had wobbled over to him.
"Kitty!" the dark elf said happily.
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Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2010 1:15 pm
Azrael flashed Howl and the strange creature a huge grin. "Of course. I'm attempting to see how many I can sneak off this time," he replied, looking as innocent as possible as he said this before his look turned to one of absolute pride.
"He does? Awesome," he added, turning to glance at the two newcomers. He remembered them vaguely from Howl's birthday party not too long ago, but he didn't recall actually introducing himself since Regina had dragged him out the door far too early insisting they had to leave. But of course, it was probably easier to tell that Howl liked the girl more than anything else about the entire conversation and conversationalists.
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Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2010 2:07 pm
Adam tumbled to the side as Devin called him 'kitty', staring up at the toddler with wide purple eyes.
Kitty? Kitties were little fluffy things. He wasn't a kitty! He wasn't even fluffy! He was just...a little fuzzy.
"M'not kitty." He insisted, frowning and waving his little legs in an attempt to right himself. "M'Adam!"
Kali giggled and moved over to pick Adam up and set him down right side up. He clapped his hands once he was, and hugged the pumpkin again.
"Ornge." He proclaimed happily to Devi, patting it. "Mine."
Luka had dislodged himself from Katia and hovered over to where Puff was attached to Howl's head. Cocking his head to the side, he looked back at Dimitri and Katia, pursing his lips.
Then, he promptly connected himself to Kali's head. Unable to choose between his host and her brother, he had decided on a compromise. This way, they wouldn't fight about it!
"Luka! Off!!" Kali yelped, tugging at the shadow. "Just because someone else does it, doesn't mean YOU have to!!"
"Why are you stealing pumpkins?" Dimitri asked Azrael, looking over at him. Who in the world would want to steal a pumpkin? And why?
She may not have been as direct, but Katia was wondering this as well.
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Posted: Wed Oct 13, 2010 3:18 pm
"Theres an awful lot of strangers here, mama..." Liesel dubiously informed her mother, peering out from behind Heloise. Her hair had cooperated with the day's outing by braiding itself around her head and not dragging too close to the ground.
"You'll be fine, dear." Heloise deftly stepped to the side exposing Liesel to the world. "Take Crunch and go pick out a nice pumpkin to carve. It'll be fun!"
Upon hearing his name, Crunch materialized out of Liesel's shadow and grabbed her hand in his eager paw. "Lunch! Munchlunch!" He started loping towards the brightly colored pumpkins, dragging the tiny little blonde behind him carelessly.
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Posted: Sat Oct 16, 2010 6:51 pm
After a moment of looking around, she spotted her friends and summoned a shadow raven, well it wasn't really a raven or a shadow, simply just a bit of black smoke that flew and clawed like a raven. She sent it to Howl and Azrael as her greeting.
Seeing a blonde little girl arriving, Eve decided to make a new friend. The little girl seemed to be pulled by her shadow and with a smile, Eve walked in their direction.
Herion spotted Crunch and smiled, having see others of his kind. He found Lilium annoying and loved to torment her for fun, but Altressa was scary in a way, very protective of her host. He left his place on her back and flew a little ahead of his ragdoll host.
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Posted: Sun Oct 17, 2010 12:32 pm
"You should have brought a wagon then," Howl said, nodding at Azrael. "I haven't seen the people in charge. I think they're all in the shop. I'm sure they won't mind." He gestured to the shop, before noticing the smoke-raven. He stared for a moment before grinning. "Eve's here," he said.
Puff stuck his tongue out at Luka. Clearly the shadow could not balance on his host's head as well as Puff could. He giggled before wandering over to Kali. He wrapped his tiny arms around her legs. "Pu?" he asked hopefully. "Pu?" Her hair was even prettier than Azrael's! His mismatched eyes widened slightly; a trick he had seen his host's younger brother use.
"Kitty," Devin said, frowning. "You a kitty named Adam." That was all Adam meant, right? After all, he did look like a kitty. He was fuzzy like a kitty. He had ears that weren't quite like a kitty, so maybe he was a puppy? "Puppy?" he asked. Whatever Adam was, he was going to keep him!
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Posted: Sun Oct 17, 2010 12:57 pm
Kali scowled as she found she could not pry Luka off, as usual, and gave up all together. She muttered darkly at him, but the little Shadow didn't notice, cooing and snuggling down into her hair.
She blinked as she felt arms around her legs and looked down. It couldn't be Luka; he was on her head. So, who was on her legs?
Turned out, it was Puff.
"What am I, a cheesy poof? What do you two want from m...." She stopped, staring down at Puff's large, mismatched eyes. He was...so...adorable...
She couldn't help the smile that twisted her lips and the small, barely audible squeal that rose in her throat. Crouching, but careful not to squish him, she giggled.
"Well aren't you a cutie. You're Puff, right?" She grinned.
Adam stared hard at Devin, as flat a look as he could manage.
"M'no puppy! M'Adam." He scowled and pointed at his chest. "A-da-mmm!" Did he not get it? Was this boy dumb? He wrinkled his nose, then remembered what his mommy sometimes called him.
"M'a beast! Mommy says so!" He beamed. Maybe Devi would understand now. And if he didn't, Adam was so not sharing his pumpkin with him...
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Posted: Tue Oct 19, 2010 8:32 pm
"Lunch-ch-ch" Crunch giggled, pausing in front of a particularly big pumpkin and attempting to shove the whole thing into his mouth while maintaining his death grip on Liesel.
"Ow!" The girl exclaimed, trying to tug her arm back. Her slightly desperate gaze cast around the pumpkin patch and caught sight of Eve heading over, and a shadow ahead of her. Maybe they could help distract Crunch into letting go of her. "Hi!" Liesel said as Eve got closer and, at the same time, Crunch sort of folded around the pumpkin and absorbed the whole thing in a rather disturbing display.
"Lunchmunchmunch." The shadow informed Herion.
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Posted: Sun Oct 24, 2010 10:06 pm
Eve smiled at her though she was not weirded out by the display of Crunch eating the pumpkin. It was tamer than many things she saw at home. "Hello." She replied back.
Herion grinned, "He, ri, on, her?" The shadow had never thought a pumpkin was tasty, well he was still a few days old and only seemed to like canned soup. "Herion."
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Posted: Wed Oct 27, 2010 2:24 pm
"Puff," Puff agreed, beaming up at Kali. Yes, he was Puff; and he was rather pleased that the pretty girl had bothered to know his name. "Pu pu uff!" It seemed the dragon-like shadow had been spending far too much time with his host. He had a particularly smug expression upon his face, and a glint in his eyes that spoke volumes of the trouble he planned to cause.
"Not a puppy?" Devin was puzzled. He put a hand to his chin, as he often had observed his father doing while thinking. "Then what are ya?" he asked. His eyes widened in realization as Adam clarified exactly what he was. Recognition swirled in golden eyes.
He beamed.
"Cool! You're the beatht from the thtory! My Daddy told me about you! He thayed you were very brave and nice and--" the toddler babbled before moving to hug Adam. "I luv you!"
Oliver was making his way over to Eve, Liesel and Crunch. He was fascinated--how had Crunch eaten the entire pumpkin? He wanted to be able to do that! "Oli?" he asked, studying Crunch. Was the other shadow hurt? "Ver?"
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