Cleaning Day
Clow Reed laughed as he watched his creations work. He never seemed to tire of the Cards and their "antics", as he called them.
"Now, Windy, be careful! I don't need you knocking anything over. The house is a complete mess as it is, without priceless, shattered artifacts all over the floor!"
He watched, smiling as Windy swept in cool breezes around and out of the room, trailing the layers of dust behind her.
Bubbles was enjoying herself, as well, and Clow had to laugh at the sour faces Keroberus made while he was repeatedly trapped in clouds of bubbles and water.
"I've been noticing that we really need a Soap Card. Or better yet, a Soup Card? Think of all the trouble it would save! You'll never have to cook soup again, or cook at all, in fact! A Cook Card, maybe? It will save you all that messy business, and the kitchen won't be needed anymore…"
Yue stood by, watchful as always, carefully directing Jump outside, where Fly was already busy doing…well, Yue had no idea. But nothing had been crashed so far, so it must be something incredibly useful that only Clow could divine out of his incredibly large imagination.
"…Maybe a larger garden, we could have Erase do away with the kitchen, and have an indoor garden…Keroberus is always complaining that it's cold outside…or we could make a storage room out of it, then the study won't be so crowded anymore! How about it Yue? Indoor-garden or storage room? You must have some kind of opinion."
Yue looked at his master, and was about to ask if that was a rhetorical question when he realized that Clow would surly be displeased with him for his stupid query and order him to do something incredibly unpleasant task only his master could come up with. So he decided that the sure way was the best way, and simply said,
"Whatever you wish, Master."
And went back to directing Watery to do a particularly savage wash of Keroberus, who was shooting him looks that predicted a violent bath for Yue himself.
Clow shook his head and continued putting forth ideas; obviously Yue was taking his duties as supervisor of the cleaning a little too seriously. He wondered if a nice vacation was in order.
"…Maybe Write Card, or a Translate Card or something. I need a challenge, maybe a card that can translate my words to another language? Of course I'll need to work on the grammatically correct translation…"
Keroberus was not enjoying himself. Cleaning day was certainly the worse day of them all. Especially since it was really useless, as everything went right back to its messy start by next day's lunch time any way.
Yue's hand signals were turning slightly more aggressive now, and Watery was enjoying having Keroberus as target practice. He swore he'd get back at both of them.
"Master…*water in face*…Watery isn't…* Water in face*…being…careful!" He managed to get out, distracting Clow's attention from his latest idea.
"Yes, yes. Keroberus, you're right. We do need something to organize all these…things…maybe an Organize Card. That would be useful…"
Keroberus would have sweatdropped, had Watery not sprayed other areas at the moment.
"YUE!!! I WILL NO STA…*water in face*!!!!"
Yue was slightly taken aback by that, and although his face showed the customary blank, inside he was considering asking Watery to be more careful. Oh, no, can't do that. There are some more greasy spots on his ears…
Another hand signal, another viciously strong spray. This time it was boiling hot.
Keroberus swiped a paw at the offending creature while Clow rambled on and Yue was busily demanding that Sword Card go back outside and prune the hedges, rain or no rain.
"Master said so. He wants the hedges perfect. *Pause* Well tell Rain that she needs to go somewhere else for a while, have her help Windy to clean the leaves out of the…*Pause* You're a magical Card! You can't get rusty! Do you want me to come out there and prune the hedges myself? *Pause* Well I can't. Keroberus still needs to be blow-dried and combed."
That done, he went back to staring at the other guardian, who was now being heated dry by Fiery, Watery having gone away to boil some water for that day's soup.
Finally, the sun guardian was dry and looking like a hairball. Mostly hidden by a fluffy mass of golden fuzz. "You are going to pay." was heard from somewhere inside the fur.
Yue ignored him, instead, he walked thorough the garden door and outside, to supervise Flower, Wood and Earthy as they worked on the hedges and patches of perennials followed closely by Sword, which cut the grass, pruned the hedges, and bickered incessantly with Shield, who was certain that some piece of hedge was very worthy of protection and couldn't be cut off.
Keroberus followed, trying to shake his fur into shape as he did so.
"You'll get your bath soon enough…then you'll see what a real Guardian can do…" he muttered.
Yue continued with his hand signals, telling Windy to go on inside and clean Keroberus's room, then go on to Clow's bedchamber, then do the one storage room they did have and report back to him for reassignment. Then he directed Rain to go tell Erase to erase all the soot in the chimney.
Sweet was just passing by, turning the occasional flower or beetle into chocolate, So Yue told it very carefully to make some desert. When asked what kind, Sweet was told to go ask Master.
Flower was getting a little too excited with her task of decoration, so Yue told her to stop.
Keroberus was munching on a flower-turned-white-chocolate, but Yue shot an ice pike through it and the morsel was blown into a million tiny, invisible pieces.
"Don't eat that stuff. Master says it's unhealthy and you won't be hungry for lunch. If that's possible." He said.
They worked for another hour, mostly replacing roof tiles and fixing windows Wood broke while she was trying to "help a hedge grow". Then Yue had to go inside to fix lunch and Keroberus was left alone in the garden, where he bothered Sword until it agreed to cut his hair.
That done, he walked back inside and watched Fiery light a fireplace and 43 candles for tonight's Card Creation ceremony.
"Which one is master creating this time? *Pause* why does he need Thunder Card if there's already a Storm Card? *Pause* No. Glow is a very nice Card, but Rain was a little silly. If there's Watery, why make Rain too? *Pause* yes, I agree completely."
While the Guardian of the Sun was busy conversing with Fiery, the Guardian of the Moon was equally busy telling Sweet the get out of the kitchen.
"No. That's supposed to be sour. No. That's supposed to taste like bread. No…well. Yes, chocolate pudding would taste ok. But not Chocolate soup! That's it. You have five seconds to get out of the kitchen before I make you into a salad!"
That got Sweet moving, she drifted out of the room looking sad, turning the occasional bowl into candy as she left.
Yue was back to work, muttering for a while, then batting at Create until the little book-like card skulked away. Voice tried to imitate him, but Yue hated the sounds and batted it away, too. Erase came by, making a plate or two disappear in its wake. Wood broke another window. Rain came and sprayed him, saying it was "from Keroberus with love. Looking forward to your bath." Clow wondered by and asked if a Cloud Card would be nice. Yue said,
"Whatever you wish, Master."
Clow patted him on the shoulder, smiled sadly, shook his head and wandered off again to see if Keroberus had anything to say about it. Yue finished decorating the rice, and then went off to find Move to help him carry everything into the dinning room.
Move was busy discussing moving some bed to the right of some room, so Yue asked Float, instead.
Once everything was set up, Yue had Voice tell Keroberus and Master it was lunchtime.
Two minutes later the Sun Guardian and Clow were seated at the table, munching and discussing making the Maze Card. Clow asked Yue if he thought a Loop Card was a good idea. Yue said, "If you wish, Master."
Keroberus said that Yue needed to learn about opinions, Clow said that was a good idea. Yue said he liked learning. Clow patted him on the shoulder, smiled sadly, and said that it was progress. Yue cleared the table, Yue made Bubbles clean the dishes. Bubbles cleaned his hair; instead, saying it was "a reminder for this evening, from Keroberus."
Clow also reminded his guardians that Yue still needed to have his bath. Keroberus chuckled evilly, then began going over it with Watery and Bubbles.
When evening finally set in and Yue was told to take a bath, the bathtub turned out to be too small. Then Keroberus made Yue stripe and be examined carefully by Bubbles, Watery and Fiery. Then he forgot to take off the hair band and got it all wet.
Bubbles got soapsuds into Yue's eyes and he had to close them. Then he got too distracted to sense where Watery was coming from and got water in his ears. Keroberus made Fiery boil the bath water too much. Watery sprayed him too hard, but forgot to clean the soapsuds from his eyes.
Then Clow came in and said he'd never seen Yue look so clean and that he should have a bath twice a day, Keroberus agreed, then chuckled evilly again. Watery sprayed the other places.
Bubbles tugged on his hair too much and Fiery nearly set it on fire.
The towel had gotten wet in the washing process (although Yue was sure it was Keroberus's vendetta against him.) and Windy was called in to blow-dry him, then Fiery nearly burned him, and in the end, Keroberus lost the hairbrush.
His cloths were soaked. Yue had to dress in Master's robes until his own were sun dried because Fiery was afraid to set them on fire (although it hadn't been reluctant to drying his hair in the least). Clow's robes were too big and Yue had to roll up the edges, then they unrolled and he tripped and fell. Keroberus still hadn't found the hairbrush and it wasn't nighttime so the Create wouldn't work. Master wanted to make a Brush Card. Then maybe a hairstylist Card, which led to the idea that Yue needed a hair cut.
Keroberus asked Sword to cut short, but it cut off too much and Yue's hair puffed out in all directions.
Clow thought it was a nice look for him and told him to keep it. Then went on to laugh about it for an hour or so.
Keroberus said he'd use his claws to brush it down, but only knocked Yue into vase on a table Sweet had turned to chocolate-which had later melted but was never replaced-making Master's robes into a sugary brown mess. Yue had to borrow new ones.
By dinnertime, Yue was nearly done preparing more food, when he was called to give his opinion about making a Golf Card. When he said he it would a great idea, Clow asked him what he was thinking, Yue said he thought Golf might be very relaxing for Keroberus, and Clow said that last one had been a rhetorical question, then dismissed him.
Keroberus had eaten the entire desert while no one was looking and couldn't eat any dinner. Clow said Yue shouldn't feed him before dinner.
At night, Yue was called to regulate the Glow card into position to make Clow's bedtime reading easy and enjoyable. Then he had to ask Create to please make a hairbrush. Create Card was still angry at being batted away earlier and made him a tooth brush, then went back to card form and refused to reappear.
Yue brushed his teeth twice that night, one with each toothbrush he now owned.
Keroberus was sharing his room because erase had accidentally erased his room and got to the bed first, leaving no room for Yue. The floor was cold and Keroberus snored too loudly.
His robes were left outside to dry, but Rain was practicing and got them wet all over again.
Clow wanted to continue cleaning tomorrow.
END