A man blowing a puff of smoke.

A giraffe.

An Eagle...Possibly?

These are the things Basil finds in the clouds, and their endless variety of shapes, even with the setting sun flooding the previous water-blue of the sky with an Orange fizz, the pieces of white cotton remained the same, although fewer.

That's something that Basil has always been rooting for after all, even if there are surface level changes in something, the important part is that beneath the layers, the object of attention always stays the same.

Case in point, his now reformed friend group, and the additional members added in.

On the surface? Extra people, and everyone looks like they've changed. (Except for one.) Past that? Nothing has really changed at all, everybody clicks together like missing parts of a greater puzzle, and overall it feels like the wounds they've all gained are finally beginning to close.

Everyone is moving on.

A concept like that had scared him to no end before, now it gives a warm rush of hope for things to continue as they are.

"Oy! Nerd! Are you even listening?!" Hearing this from down below, he tilts his head, a groan coming out from Kimberly.

"Ughhhh, I hate being so flipping short! Everyone else is too damn tall! Always getting lost in something! Give me some of that height so I can put my head in the clouds too! All I ever get to do is headbutt people taller than me...In the nuts!" Ah Kimberly, oh Kimberly...Never change.

"That's a rather violent positive." He comments, a light humored smile on his face.

Kim pouts at him then, crossing her arms. "Well if you don't like it, how about you come up with something more peeeaceful." She remarks, dragging out the last word there a tad.

Basil puts a hand to his chin then, pondering deeply about the question, as he stares off into space once more. Until his eyes light up with mischief, and his smile splits into a smug grin. Now being pointed right at the brunette.

Kim stammers out in an defensive tone, "the hell is that goofy dork grin for?!" and, "if you have something to say, then say it already!"

Well, if you insist.

This is a typical dance between them, a game if you will, one in which poor poor Kimberly rarely ever wins.

Lowering himself by leaning the top half of his body forward, Basil stares right into her, through her perhaps, watching her gears turn. Feeling the rush of a plan coming together, and hitting every mark as it rushes it's way to the finish line.

"Taller guys just so happen to like girls who are more...'Fun-sized.' How's that for a peaceful positive?"

Check.

The girl stands there, her previous defiant gaze now shifting down to a variety of emotions, that cast her mousy face in various different lights, even though the red glow of a blush stays the same. Her mouth flaps open and closed, stuttering, searching for a sentence that refuses to appear. It fills him with the greatest of highs, as the dam that is his grin begins to leak, snorting and snickers, giggles and wheezers.

Mate.

Like a volcano, erupting at the seams, lifting ash, smoke, and finally lava into the air, Kim's resulting reaction is nothing short of a glorious masterpiece in Basil's eyes.

"W-what the fric-fudg-fff-mmmmmmm!!! What the fright-flipping-fuck Basil!" She shouts, as the aforementioned dam of endless tempests of hysterics finally overwhelm the boy, and he rears his body back, almost as if pushed by an invisible recoil, that being his own laughter - of which, has erupted into that of a cackling hyena who can barely catch his own breath. Holding his sides in pain as he falls on the ground, rolling, bawling, shrieking in ridiculous amounts of comical frenzy.

Kim grits her teeth, but sighs out in a defeated exasperation, "you're such a jerk sometimes." She stands looming over him as he turns around and around on the grass, gasping for air desperately as he still continues laughing. She watches him then, and feels herself begin to chuckle, then grin, then giggle, until finally it bubbles up to laughter as well, as she joins in on the wonderland of silliness that the flower boy has now infected her with.

Lounging in the grass are the dwarf and the elf, the brunette and the blonde, the thief and the flower boy. Now both having found themselves staring at the clouds. A comfy warm silence falling over them as the sun continues it's plunge downwards past the roofs of the houses in Faraway, and underneath where they lay on the blue planet.

"Hey, I've been meaning to ask..." The 'fun-sized' girl begins, prompting a curious look from the 'Green Giant', as she had found herself titling him in an act of desperate revenge...That kinda fell flat if she was being honest

"What did you and..." She gives a hand motion of her left twirling about downwards, almost like a whirpool. "YOUR gang, I guess, do before you met us? Before uh...Whatever it was that split you apart. I know we all met each other a few times at the playground when we were really little, but those are the few times we ever spent with each other...I guess um...What was it like back then? 'The good ol' days' and all that."

Basil ponders, his eyes drifting off towards the clouds, as the memories sink in, and while there's a warm feeling in his chest, he still feels like his gut is being stabbed, and somebody just twisted the knife.

"It was...Um...W-well for starters, it was...A bit like a cloud y'know? Warm, soft, bouncy, cozy, and uh...Fun." He says, staring up at the exact point of reference. To which Kim follows his gaze, staring up where he is.

"Somedays I miss those times more than others, because we were all together back then...We were...We were a family away from family. Some of us were having hard lives even then, so we leaned on each other a lot." A flash of pink pops up in their heads at the mention of hard lives, as both of the two cloudgazers frown ever so slight.

"I told Sunny...Before he moved away, that I was hoping that things could go back to the way they were before...Sometimes it feels like it'll never happen." Basil's frown deepens further, as Kim looks to him in concern at his plight.

"So many things have popped up, I just...I just don't know when the hits will stop coming, when the torrent of...Of...Of bullcrap will just stop flowing for a few seconds so we can try fixing what we have." Basil feels his voice tremble, he can feel the tears pricking at the edges of his vision, he should try to stop this, but he can't. He's needed somebody to vent to, desperately. And as tempting as the offers from the rest of the gang are, sometimes you just need a release from someone who's at least now, well, fairly impartial.

"But it doesn't, and I-I'm getting tired of marching on, I marched on for Sunny, I marched on for M-m-Mari, and-and...I'm just...I'm just reaching my-my damn limit here, and I am so so so sorry that I am burdening you with this, and you'll probably hate me for this and it's okay if you do because I hate me too, and I don't blame you for bullying m-" Kim feels herself moving, tuning the words out as she looks at the boy before her, a broken boy, who despite all of his teasing and his supposed recovery, is still locked in a throne of despair as it's miserable ruler. A boy crowned King of something he's never wanted, yet has felt the need to bear anyway. And now, her soul is asking-no, demanding that she move and do something, anything to help this big sad jerk in his desperate hour.

And so without a single bit of thinking, she gets up to her knees, crawls over, and flops onto his trembling self, wrapping her arms around him and under him, as she tries squeezing him out of whatever downward spiral he's found himself in.

The first thing he sees upon opening his eyes, is the peaceful light of the moon, and the feeling of warmth enveloped around him against the night air.

He looks at her now, hidden beneath the hood of her sweater, and he feels his face heat up, before dismissing the thought in his mind.

No, she deserves better.

He lightly sends a whisper of thanks to her, before dislodging himself, as best as he can, without waking her up.

Looks like his walk back home will be double the length tonight, he'll have to apologize to Mo-er, Polly.

As he walks back in the enchanting lunar glow cast upon the entire town, he feels the decently-heavy girl he's carrying shift around. Mumbling words he simply pretends not to hear for the time being, even as his growing smile and the heat of his cheeks betrays such a hopeless endeavor.

Here's to hoping Vance doesn't kill him when he shows up on their doorstep...! Oh God he probably is gonna kill him.

They had been at a standstill for what seemed to Basil, like a hundred years, an uncomfortable silence had descended upon the three figures in the doorway, one of them currently sleeping in another's arms.

Then, like the flash of a muzzle in a dark empty room, the big brother interrupts. "I haven't known ya for very long Basil, and I'm sorry for all the nasty crud we've put you through, but for what it's worth, I just want you to know that..." He stops for a second, as Basil's nerves jitter up. "I approve!" Basil is left blinking in confusion, as Vance, with no resistance from the other boy, takes his Sister off of the Blonde's hands.

"Have a good night!" The door is shut, and the flower boy is left to his thoughts in the wind and the moon.

What in the world did he mean? Basil has found himself asking that question all the way now to his front door, as he absentmindedly opens the door to his house, turning to shut it all the way since both him and Polly have recently made the discovery it hasn't been shutting all the way unless given a hard push or pull. Which means there is no quiet entry for him tonight as he would've liked, so knowing this, Basil turns around, opening his mouth.

"Hey Polly I'm..." The words die in his throat, as before him lies something that is not right.

A darkened, narrow, barren hallway, the only thing he can make out is the all-consuming dark that refuses to let him see even a few feet in front of him. The foreboding hall keeping him in his place.

After taking a few seconds to wind up the nerve to turn away from the darkness, he grips his hand around the door handle, trying as hard as he can, putting in every muscle, all of his weight behind just trying to open this damn door!

It turns out, such an effort was not needed, as BASIL promptly finds himself falling forward, accidentally letting go of the door handle on his way down.

He takes a second, turning his head back towards the door, and the pitch black hallway within. There is no movement.

Swallowing a lump in his throat, he gets up, shakily approaching the door. Still no movement.

He grips the handle, and with a woosh, closes the signage he may just be crazy.

Ding.

Dong.

Ding.

Dong.

The haunting churchbells begin to sound, casting their eerie melody into the night, much like the moonlight being cast onto him and his lawn at this very moment.

His head frantically snaps to each direction, the bells having no discernible direction, rather they're coming from all around. This further drives his nerves up the wall, as the night air begins to turn the sweat on his body cold.

Adding to the chill is the wind, which picks up various leaves, moving them all about.

The young man hugs himself, trembling, as he still circles his gaze around, but that's when something catches his eye. Moving shadows, replacing moonlight along to his right, moving across the previously beautifully lit town, towards him.

BASIL's gaze moves to the sky, and the feeling of his heart sinking fills him with such...terror.

The moon, is slowly but surely, being obscured by a shape, black as the hallway he just escaped from, as it continues to engulf the light source, almost like a terrifying monster eating up an unsuspecting prey.

The bells rise further in volume, reaching a crescendo as screams across the town escape into the night air, as BASIL can only stare at the eclipse. Because he doesn't want to give the SOMETHING in the trees any attention at all.

BASIL is AFRAID.

06/20/05.