Enter Jon Arbuckle - a regular loser in a regular town who sees absolutely nothing wrong with talking to his cat. The man in question has been the sole individual to hear his cat talking back for some significant amount of years, but that’s not the problem, today. Today, there’s something a little bit more unusual about his favourite feline. For starters, there’s been a substitution…

“You know, Garfield; after all these years trying to convince you not to eat my lasagna, I figured it’d be easier just to make two.”

Instead of the expected - his cat taking both and eating them in seconds - the figure on the counter was not the domestic orange tabby he expected. He was larger, for a start. He was wearing clothing, also. Most concerning, though, was the very, very wide smile.

“THAT’S A VERY NICE OFFER, SWEETHEART, BUT I’M TEMPORARILY OUT OF ITEMS TO TRAAAAADE.”

“You’re… not… Garfield?”

“I COULD TELL YOU I MOST ASSUREDLY AM, BUT I GET THE SENSATION THAT YOU WERE EXPECTING SOMEONE ELSE. TELL ME ALL ABOUT IT, PERHAPS WE CAN MAKE A DEEEEEEAAAAAALLLLLLL…”

Meanwhile, in a totally different planar system…

Three adventurers looked down at the large ginger tabby curled up with a teddy bear behind the counter.

“Do… you think maybe he went on a diet?”

“I’m pretty sure that’s just a regular cat,” said Merle.

“Gee willikers, Fantasy Tintin, what was your first fucking clue?” said Taako. True Seeing and Detect Magic both told him that (a) this was not quite a regular cat and (b) there were some extraplanar shenanigans going on. “Anyone got Speak to Animals?”

“I could–” volunteered Merle.

“Absolutely not. You’re gross enough with the plant kingdom, Dad. Silencio on that fucking noise.” He dug out his telepathic band and thought gently at the cat. Hey there, amigo. Don’t wanna alarm you, but you’re not where you belong.

The cat blinked. Yawned and stretched. Sat up and scratched himself in a very Human way. Either it’s a Monday or I’m dreaming super realistically…

“Wrong on both counts,” said Taako, strictly for the benefit of his teammates. “I think it’s a weekend, and definitely not a dream.”

“Well, there’s a line in a song that says you’re wrong,” said Magnus.

Things tended to escalate from that point onwards.

[TAZ Prompts Remaining: 7]

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• strawberry: favorite desserts?

I am a chronic sweet tooth, so anything with loads of sugar in it has my vote. Salted Caramel Anything generally gets my attention on any menu. Since I’m on the Keto, sugar of all kinds is verbotten territory unless it’s a feast day, so I go for the biggest hit in the least amount of time.

That said, I’m also a sucker for the finer things in life. Lindt chocolate, Guillian - those seashell hazelnut praline things, Ferrero Roche’s and Jersey Caramels :D There’s also a brand of boysenberry ripple ice cream out my way that’s just The Bomb. Yummo.

• cherry: can you play any musical instruments or can you sing?
  

My immediate family says ‘no’ to both. The meanies. I have been told by more distant relatives that I have a decent singing voice. If anything, my desire to imitate the original version I heard probably lets me down. I’m middle of the road, vocally, so the high notes and the low notes get me in the end.

[Boy, someone’s having fun…]

• tangelo: if you could be any mythical creature, which would you be?

I want to be a Dragon, but I’d probably wind up as a Kobold if I tried it.

• watermelon: do you have a job? if so, what is your job title?
  

I am, alas, not on anyone’s payrolls. I don’t even earn enough from my writing to call it a job.

• blackberry: is your life an action film, a comedy, a romantic comedy, or drama?
  

In my darker moments, I suspect my life is a sitcom and I’m the writers’ butt monkey. I’m probably closer to one of those artsy films where they take you into Imagination Land for a good 50% of the screen time.

• mango: what is your trademark?

The ability to say things sideways in such a way as to alienate my readers. And starting sentences with ‘and’… and a love of the ellipsis…

• pineapple: sexual orientation?
  

Panromantic demisexy [and slightly obtuse. You have to have a big, glittery sign that says, “I’M FLIRTING WITH YOU” and even then I will notice the glitter before reading it]

• kiwi: what’s something that fascinates you?

I always return to murder most foul. How they did it, if they got away with it, what forensics can teach us about how to capture them etc etc. I can’t stay away from that shit.

• peach: do you have any piercings or tattoos?
  

I have two traditional ear piercings and I once gave myself an accidental tattoo with a gun. (semi-long story)

• raspberry: favourite flower?
  

Jacarandas, frangipanis, and those carnation-like things that change colour [I think they’re called “Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow” but it’s been literal years]

• coconut: favorite perfume?
  

Beloved once purchased a perfume that smells exactly like spun sugar. That one.

[AN: Wishing you well in your battle with the panics. May your happies at least quiet the little beasties down]

Angus McDonald, age six and a half, woke before the alarm was about to go off and, just in time, reached out to silence its musical chime. Papa hadn’t even entertained getting him a mechanical alarm with its harsh and frightening bell. That sort of thing brought back too many bad memories and Papa understood.

That was one of the reasons why he was doing this. One amongst very many.

Glasses on (he had the freedom of vision whenever he wanted it) slippers on his feet and bathrobe over his pyjamas (no more cold floors leaching heat and sensation from his toes) and gathered his clothes for the day (he had a choice, no more grey, thinning clothing that did nothing against either the chill or the heat) and padded off to the bathroom to wash. No more rough treatment from Nurse Stronginthearm. No more tepid water that smelled of carbolic and pee. No more harsh scrubbing sponges. He could take his pick of soaps and washing instruments, he could linger and luxuriate in bathing if he wanted to. But he chose to be quick and efficient, this morning.

This morning was parents’ day.

Washed, dressed, and the bathroom tidied up, he crept down to the kitchen and started gathering tools an ingredients. Two cookbooks, one scroll copied from Fantasy Youtube, and some of his own notes.

He was going to make his parents some lava cakes for parents day.

Angus had to melt the chocolate in a double boiler since Papa wouldn’t touch a Fantasy Microwave with a Barge Pole of Reaching. That was okay. He knew how to do that. Even for two batches of ganache. One hazelnut praline for Papa, and the other dark chocolate blood orange for Dad

Once they were ready, he poured them into the ice cube containers and popped them into the freezer. While they were cooling, he washed up and got the cake moulds and batter ready.

That was from one of Papa’s best cake recipes. The Choc-o-licious cake. Working on that batter took all the time he needed to have for the ganache to freeze.

Problem. The Fantasy Youtube video hadn’t told him about greasing the ice cubes tray. It took some serious twisting and at least one count of taking a cube out of the tray in small fragments.

Papa always said to use the happy accidents. Therefore, he stirred the little frozen chips into the batter and hoped for the best. One Choc-o-licious with the hazelnut ganache. The other with the dark chocolate blood orange. All set carefully into the right place in the Aga for cakes.

So far, so good. Sort of.

Angus cleaned up and peeked into his parents’ cote. They were still snuggled under the covers. The dawn light had yet to creep into Papa’s eyes and force him into consciousness.

It was so tempting to just crawl in there for a small nap, but he had cakes in the oven. Therefore, he went back to the kitchen with one of his favourite Caleb Cleveland books, and nearly burned them.

Which was why he wasn’t thinking when he smelled burning. He ran to the oven and pulled the tray out without first putting on an oven mit. It burned! It fell. Hot cake mess spattered all over the place and then Papa blinked into the area.

He stepped on the hot tray and in boiling-hot lava cake to scoop him up and then hurried him to the nearest bathroom. Cool water soothed Angus’ hurts and a minor potion of healing solved all the injuries.

Angus was still crying. “Your feet. I hurt your feet.”

“I’m the one who stepped in the hot stuff, bubeleh.” He finally ran his own feet under the cool water and downed a potion of his own. “See? All better.” Papa scooped him into his arms and purred. Soft and gentle and reassuring.

Angus still felt bad about the cakes. “I wan’ed to surprise you with a cake each an’ I was makin’ you some special lava cakes and I almost burned them and I didn’t mean to hurt myself an’ I’m so sorry…”

Papa rocked him. “Hey. Hey, little man. Hey. Hey, listen. It’s okay. We all make mistakes. It’s fine.”

“It’s parent’s day,” Angus sniffled. “Wan’ed t’ do somethin’ special.”

“Hey,” said Dad, who came in to see what the fuss was about. “You know what’s more special than cakes in bed?”

Sniff. “What?”

“Cakes made together.”

Once all hurts were healed and the damage undone via Prestidigitation practice, Taako surveyed Angus’ plan. “Not some bad invention, there, little dude. Good job putting it all together like that.”

Angus started smiling again. “Really?”

“Yeah, you did some good detective work there.” Papa gave him a hug and a kiss. “Want to learn the best way to do a ganache?”

Cooking together with Papa and Dad was the best. Papa knew every trick about cooking good food and showed them to anyone willing to learn. Dad and Ango grouped together as apprentices.

They learned a lot that morning. Including that ganache lava was best with ice cream.

“Thanks for being my parents,” he said.

“Thanks for being our kid,” said Dad.

“Without you, we’d have no special occasion to have cake for,” added Papa.

After that, the best part of the day - snuggling with his parents for a lazy day in. All cuddles and kisses and comfort.

[TAAZ Prompts Remaining: 9]

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[AN: more or less directly following from Kitchen Fight over on AO3]

Criminals were a superstitious and cowardly lot. Likewise, so were performers. Therefore, the cast and crew of Montgomery Pithon’s Amazing Circus were doubly superstitious and cowardly as any of the two previous groups. He had something of a story. He had to have reserve stories.

People loved stories. So far, the miraculous appearance of two Sun Elves was goon enough, but sooner or later, questions would be asked. He had to act quickly.

There should be some spare clothing about their size somewhere in the costume cart. He snagged the most sympathetic and gullible person who had finished their food. Lammerly. “I’m certain we’d like our new guests to feel welcome. There’s room for a couple of bunks in my office trailer, but clean clothes of good quality won’t go amiss. You savvy?”

Lammerly’s eyes went wide. “Oooh. Yes! Should I make them some spiced honey milk? The fae folk love spiced honey milk. It’ll make them feel welcomed for sure.”

Monty sprained something making the effort to not roll his eyes. “Sure. Clothes first, of course. Then the beverages. They are, after all, still eating.” He glanced over to his trailer, where the twins had finished their plates and had begun on his neglected one.

He could deal with one less meal. They clearly couldn’t. He slithered towards the chuck wagon to round up a big bowl of leftovers. Not that that was very much. A gratefully hungry crew had only left scrapings inside the containers.

Montgomery added a heel of bread and an armload of apples to the haul before slithering back to the twins. “I guessed you might be hungry,” he said, depositing the bounty before them. “Fill those empty bellies. Then we’ll get some bedrolls installed in my office,” he gestured at the cart.

“Where the money is?” said one.

“No,” said Montgomery, five steps ahead of them already.

*

It was a state that didn’t last long. The twins over-ate, then made pigs of themselves with the spiced honey milk. So naturally they were more than a little regretful about that before the night ended.

“…ooooOoOOooooOOOOoooogh…”

“While I’m inclined to advise you take it easy,” said Montgomery. “There’s an entire camp that would like breakfast. I can carry you gently there if you like.”

“…ithinki’mgunnabesick…”

“We’ll be packing up and moving out,” Montgomery advised. They had slept in their new clothes. Of course they had. “So a light, quick breakfast is advisable.”

He piggy-backed them to the chuck wagon, where the twins did a few interesting things with toast and eggs. Their bickering was greatly reduced, that morrow. A state that would definitely not last long.

Inside of two days, they started getting into stuff. They rifled through Montgomery’s office and found nothing more interesting than maps and paperwork.

He glared them down until they started putting everything back.

The instant the circus hit the next town, he had a "beginner’s act” for the twins. It didn’t take a lot of talent. Anyone could do it. “Tell me,” he said. “Have either of you heard of the Wild Man of Bor’ne’o?”

They hadn’t. He explained it. All they had to do was wear “Wild Man” costumes in a prop cage in the sideshow, talk amongst themselves in their own language, and occasionally snarl at the visitors who paid a silver to come gawk at them.

Low light conditions would help, since their odd eyes would glow in those circumstances. It would also hide the fact that their hair would be dressed to look like it was unkempt and riddled with sticks and assorted debris.

The story of the mysterious wild Elves would be heavily embellished, and the barkers would play it up for all they were worth. Meanwhile, some of the those with less to do would be making ridiculously simple ‘witch eye’ shields out of cardboard, sticks, and coloured cellophane.

Cheap, disposable, and sold for profit enough to make twice as many when the day was done. The frames included some horseshit sigils around the edge.

The rubes ate it up. Good news.

The twins were unnervingly good at it. Not so good news. On one hand, they were brilliant. On the other hand, that meant they were going to get bored.

The twins were going to need training.

Montgomery was going to have to come up with some horseshit so that his crew would be willing to teach these kids.

Fuck.

[TAZ Prompts Remaining: 10]

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“Us” is my headcannon for what the twins call their private twin language. It’s appeared in several of my fics.

It’s not cannon at all, I just like that Taako and Lup have their own language.

[Super huge thanks to @dualityandsuch for the lovely arts]

Life was good, working with a circus. Regular meals, so long as they didn’t mind doing the cooking. Cameraderie and companionship on a level only fellow villains could understand. The only downside was that villager people didn’t exactly trust carnie types and they trusted Elven carnie types even less.

Lulu and Koko were with a Sea Elf called La’ming Tonn, a ‘rescue’ from a far worse circus who didn’t know what kind of talent they’d had. She’d been with Mongomery’s Amazing Circus for two years and had grown into her confidence like kudzu into a neglected lot. Gossip had it that she was saving her spare shekels to get a Restoration spell or five and regain the losses caused by having her ears docked by her previous employer.

On the plus side, it meant she didn’t have to work very hard on Disguise Self. Just a simple change of her natural blue skin tone for a more Human-acceptable brownish beige, and making sure her hair or scarf covered the obvious difference between herself and the humanmen around them. On the minus side…

She, and some other Elves in the troupe could easily tell that Lulu and Koko were minors and would not let them out into the towns for any sort of shenanigans.

The other minus side was having to drag along Borstok, one of the circus roustabouts, to stand around and Be Human so that the local City Watch wouldn’t drag them off for Shopping While Elven.

The Xenophobia Wars may have ended, but the attitude that started them was alive and well and threatening to start another round.

La’ming could pass as Human. The twins could not. They were there to hand out flyers to passers-by and otherwise look like respectable Elven citizens who were just passing through. They were not to pick pockets, Koko, set things on fire, Lulu, or try on any hustles or scams, both of you. They were also there to be certain La’ming didn’t flirt with any married people of any given gender.

It had all been going so good, talking hat designs with the local milliner, a half-Elf of Moon Elf origins called Mak’arune. The twins had been peering through the window at some of the Fascinators when the Watch turned up.

“Good morrow, madames and sir,” said the spokesman. “It is my duty to inform you Elves that assemblies of three or more peoples are unlawful by decree of the Duke of Westingstoke under the Riot Act of the Year of the Concussed Whelk[1].”

Koko was the first to whirl in alarm. “Where the fuck is Borstok?”

“Any further disruptive language will be treated as Public Indecency.”

The twins clapped their hands over each other’s mouths. And then La’ming really put her foot in it. She primped her vibrantly red hair and said, “Hello, there handsome. I’m pretty certain there’s been a misunderstanding. Perhaps I can clear some air?” She showed them her docked ears. Purely by accident, of course, but they could see that she wasn’t Human.

The official charge was Unlawful Assembly, but three out of four Elven folk knew that they’d been arrested for Shopping While Elven. The worst part was that they’d dispersed La’ming’s Disguise Self and revealed her blue skin to the world. Therefore adding a charge of minor fraud to the sheet.

They had been in the Ranratton City Watch Cell for half an hour and Mak’arune had yet to stop her wailing hysteria.

Lulu was propping up the wall. Koko was sitting on the single bunk and holding his head up while he watched Mak’arune pace and cry. La’ming was evaluating the cell like a professional. “New straw mattress. Decent bed frame construction. Clean cell. No rats. Maybe four tin cups out of a potential six.”

“Five silver says she faints before she stops crying,” muttered Lulu.

Koko sat up a little from his huddle. “You even got five silver?”

“Monty gave it to us for shopping,” said Lulu. “Get ourselves a little treat.”

“Well I ain’t got five silver.”

“Loan it to you.”

Koko went back to his huddle, only moving his eyes as he watched Mak’arune wail, flail, and pace along the wall and back.

“I am going,” said Koko at length, “to fucking stew Borstok.”

“Hush-hush,” said La’ming. “They can still charge you with offensive language.”

Koko swapped to Us and cussed up a storm. They couldn’t get him for cussing if they didn’t know he was cussing. Only Lulu could understand what he was saying and was reacting more like he was telling a joke that turning the air blue with invective.

Four hours of utter boredom later, Montgomery Pithon, owner of the circus and actual Naga. They could tell he was arriving by the way the City Watch looked incredibly alarmed and at least one of them ran for the weapons lock-up.

Lulu could recognise the voices of his Ringmaster, Barstock, and two other Humanmen from the crew. Vellos and Brinn. Monty had brought out the big guns. Or rather, the biggest, most muscular Humanmen he had on hand to make an impressive show of things.

As if a large, black and red Naga wasn’t impressive enough.

Koko stood and switched back to Common. “Monty’s here.”

Lulu leaped away from the wall and clung to the bars. “Monty! Monty, we didn’t do anything!”

Mak’arune turned towards the bars, took a great, big, shuddering gasp… and fainted dead away.

La’ming lunged off the bed and caught her before she could hurt herself.

“MONTY!”

“MONTY!”

There he was. The man himself. If you could call a Naga who could stand at seven feet tall a ‘man’. He worked out, so his arms and chest carried impressive muscles. All under a pseudomilitary ringmaster’s jacket. What he was not wearing was his top hat, because that was resting on top of Koko’s head.

“I see you’ve been looking after my hat,” said Montgomery, retrieving it through the bars.

“I was gonna get my own, but we got arrested for doing nothing,” Koko complained.

Montgomery noticed Mak’arune. “Who’s the unfortunate maiden on the floor?”

“You know La’ming, boss,” cheered Lulu.

La’ming said, “This was supposed to be our milliner. Mak’arune. Our entire business day is shot to heck.” She patted Mak’arune at her face. “Come, love. Wakey wakey, now. It’s only our boss…”

Mak’arune whimpered and clung to La’ming.

Lulu elbowed Koko, and muttered, “I ship it,” in Us.

Montgomery glared at her. He didn’t understood their twin tongue, but automatically assumed they were swearing. “Quite,” he iced. “I trust my party will be allowed to purchase some hats from your excellent milliner, Lady Mak’arune?”

The nervous Watch, realising that their harassment had turned into a parade, nervously nodded and let them go.

They’d have to do at least one more performance to sell the tickets to refill the circus’ Bail Fund.

[1] Borrowed liberally from Australian gold rush history where the Riot Act prevented groups of three or more persons and declared them Unlawful Assembly. Fun times.

[TAZ Prompts Remaining: 10]

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[AN: Yet another instance of @dualityandsuch​ egging me on because she’s the only one who knows what the Baby Birds AU even is. I see you hiding there. So. In brief:

• The Hunger doesn’t exist
  
• The Relics don’t exist
  
• Bureau of Benevolence does?
  
• August McDonald adopted Killian
  
• Killian marries Carey Fangbattle
  
• They adopt tiny twins - BB Lup & Taako [Lulu and Koko] age 8-10?
• They get Sellsnow Farm via estate auction from the lingering Starlights [Grunkle Taako’s kids & grandkids] who have already disavowed relation to the twins because assholes
• The estate wards don’t react to the twins and the Sweetflips Moms work out what’s up. Fortunately, legal adoption includes them into the family.
• Surviving Starlights sued for fraud (they deserve it) which funds the estate restoration back to the country farm it once was.
• Twins grow into young teens via Terrible Elf Larvae Shenanigans. BB Lup transitions as soon as her nature is confirmed [like one year after she realises who she is] and the family budget takes a suckerpunch because the spell is hella expensive.
• Carey and Killian take turns adventuring, alternating with raising their Elf Larvae. Include Elf Practice gag
• Teen Twins in some kind’a boarding school that isn’t quite hell but is pretty snobbish and has some shitty rules that the twins don’t like [because of course]
• Somewhere in the previous three points, the Twins start getting into solving crimes somehow.
• Tell their tales to Young!Lucretia, who chronicles their tall tales and turns them into an adventure series called The Terrific Twins.
• Series is a fucking hit. Whoops.
• BB Angus shows up. 4YO sweet baby genius, picked on because orphan in cardboard shoes. 
• L&T remember their time in a govt foster shelter and adopt the boy at school. Take him home for Candlenights
• Moms find out that this might not be a legal thing to do, contact the school and find out that nobody really cares for this sweet, tiny orphan boy.
• Boom. Third child. Babyest brother. Grats, kiddo, you got two moms, two big siblings, and all four of them are gonna teach you how to cook, ride deer, and speak a lot more languages than you bargained on. Yay!
• Terrific Twins becomes Terrific Trio. More proactive since they’re no longer stumbling into trouble, but actively finding it thanks to genius babyest brother being a detective.
• Somehow run into Magnus on an adventure. He’s “the dog”.
• Merle is the shitty teacher who really shouldn’t be teaching. Chief reason why the Trio can scoot out of school and get up to shenanigans.
• Principal Davenport initially tries to stop them, or at least make it clear that this sort of horseshit is Dangerous Beans and they are children… Children deserve safety, etc. etc.
• When Angus argues, “Isn’t helping to capture criminals making the world safer, sir?” Dav just… gives up. Starts helping them both covertly and overtly.
• Carey and Killian are both impressed and horrified. Can and will show up to rescue their doofus kids. “For people who are so smart, you lot find yourselves in a LOT of dumb situations.”
• Encounter Krav and Barry whilst investigating MegaBigBad. Lup has crush on Nerdy young Barold and gets shy and flustered. Taako and Krav pretty much double-entendre battle from the get-go.
• Love reforms the villains arc. More accurately, love reforms the minions of the villains and they find a way to get around MegaBigBad’s threats [possibly by short-circuiting them?] {Honestly, is there a villain threat that can’t be completely dissolved by coming clean and being determined to be a better person in future?}
• Random shenanigans henceforth with all the faves, fluff, cuddles, and smooches for all!

And that’s the plan for the entire thing. This is just a little snippet.]

“…doonts, doonts durn-dun, doonts, doonts durn-dun…”

“Koko, stop singing your own theme music.”

“Shuttup.”

“You shuttup,” said Lulu.

A muffled voice from within Koko’s bag said, “Please, sir and ma’am, could you both hush?”

The twins instinctively clapped their hands on each others’ mouths. Right. They had to do this without their moms finding out. Or at least, they had to do this without their moms finding out right now. Bickering about shit was the easiest way for two hyper-competent super-agents from the Bureau of Benevolence to find out that their adopted kids were stealing babies before they were anywhere close to Elven maturity.

They shared a telepathic Look, and got on with sneaking an orphan into their home.

Angus McDonald, four-year-old orphan, was in the pocket spa inside Koko’s bag of holding. With any luck, he would remain undetectable to the estate wards until he was somehow officially adopted into the family.

They were still working on that part of the plan, to be honest. Hell, they were still working on step one - get Angus inside the wards without their moms finding out.

They made it into the house, proper, a gigantic construction moulded into a living tree by generations of Elves over possibly millennia. So far, so good. They used the less-popular pathways to get to their room, and finally opened the pocket spa once behind that particular closed door.

Angus emerged, soaking wet and heavily perfumed. “Thank goodness. Everything was spilling in there.”

“So take a bath in the ensuite,” said Koko.

“We got some old clothes you can use,” added Lulu.

“We’ll smuggle you some food in a few.”

“Hell, we’ll cook you some food, babe.”

Koko wrapped the dripping boy up in a large towel and an equally big hug. “It’s gonna be okay, kiddo. We promise.”

*

Killian saw everything. The twins cooking way more than they usually would, even for a post-school feast. Loading up bowls and containers with enough to feed maybe three people or more.

She didn’t confront her kids, but rather went to her wife Carey, who was busy with post-mission paperwork in her office.

“The twins are up to something,” she said.

“It’s them, said Carey. “When are they not up to something?”

“Wanna make sure it’s nothing nefarious?”

“Only if you fill out the rest of this field report for me.”

“Done and done.”

“You certainly have been,” she high-fived Killian on the way out, and went Stealth.

*

Softly, softly, catchee… two young Elves who had a habit of finding trouble before it was lost. Carey was quieter than a shadow as she crept after the twins. It had been half a decade since she’d last caught them at something nefarious, so they were way beyond due. Either that or they were getting better at being completely sneaky.

She didn’t know whether to be proud of them or pissed off.

“Feeling better, kiddo?” That was Koko.

“Yes, sir, thank you. These clothes kind’a fit where they touch, though, sir.” That… was a complete stranger. A very young sounding complete stranger.

“I’ll find you something with drawstrings, babe, gimmie a mo,” that was Lulu.

“Wow, ma’am, I’ll never be able to eat all that,” said the suspiciously young stranger.

“That’s what all the Preservation Boxes are for. So you’re like… set whenever you’re hungry,” said Lulu.

“Boom. Instant food security,” said Koko.

Aw shit, thought Carey. She moved closer to their room. Okay. So. They had someone with them, and that someone was likely hungry. Someone who didn’t belong here. Yet.

Since they sounded so young, they had to come from Miller Academy.

They’re too young to be stealing babies, what the hell are they up to?

In just a few more steps, she saw for herself.

There was a very small half-elven lad, darker in hue than the twins, somewhere in the middle of some old clothing that was one good sneeze away from falling off him. Which only made him look even smaller.

There were the twins, getting him to try samples of their cooking. Being good hosts but not -say- early bloomers who had had an ‘interesting episode’ and come home with a freshly-adopted kid.

Nope. They were going for a more defacto adoption. He followed us home and he needs one, moms. Can we keep him? Yeah. This was seventeen colours of bad.

Carey cleared her throat, causing the twins to jump in front of the young stranger in a protective manner. “You have five minutes to explain yourselves, kids. Then we’re calling Miller’s.”

“Please don’t send me back in there, ma’am, the twins only brought me here because I didn’t wanna go back to the orphanage.”

Well shit. He’d just said the magic words. “All of you. Living room. Family discussion.

Lulu patted the kid on the shoulder and said, “Chin up. We’re not dead yet.”

Yikes. Now that was a blast from the past…

*

“Miller Academy, what’s the sitch?”

“Yeah, this is Killian Fangbattle. One of Lulu and Koko’s moms? Yeah. Uhm. Our two came back home with a third? Are you missing anyone? Like… who’s supposed to be staying there?”

Merle flipped through some paperwork. “Oh. Uh. We only have one kid who was staying. Angus… McDonald. Orphanage kid on the grant.”

“So he is from the orphanage? We’re not in any legal trouble for having him at our place, are we?”

Merle looked at the paperwork with a magnifying glass. “They won’t even miss him, and we won’t either. Tell you what. You keep him for the holidays and we can send you a cut of what the orphanage is paying us to keep him out of their halls.”

The caller hung up.

*

Killian slammed the Stone of Farspeech onto the counter. It took all her strength not to swear. Ten deep breaths. She had to control her anger around a kid from the orphanages. It never did to be angry around kids like that.

“Okay,” she said at length. “Carey? Babe? We’re having another baby.”

[TAZ Prompts Remaining: 8]

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