AN: I said I might do a Bonfire night one of these, so I decided: Why not? There's a surprising amount of stuff going on at the moment isn't there? But yeah… Celebrations rule! (the sweets and the parties!)Like the Halloween one, this is set before the visitors get there in the House of GoT. Really, you need to have read the first two chapters of that to get people's personalities, but the more you've read the better.
Betcha can't guess whose pov this is in?
Disclaimer: I am not Marianne Curley. The only thing I own is the randomness. YAY! Randomness! Also, there's a random quote in here. I can't remember where I got it, but it's not mine. I'm just 'borrowing' it.
Guessed it yet?
Kyla
"Yay!" Dillon cries as he slides down the hand rail on the stairs. "It's nearly firework time!"
I laugh. "Dillon, it's only four O'clock in the afternoon. You know it won't be dark 'til about half five."
It's Firework night all ready, a dangerous time for us in the house. Lathenia's terrified of fire. Ethan, Matt and Dillon begged Lorian continually until he gave in and said they could have a bonfire anyway. The conditions are that they can only burn a Guy Fawkes made of something non-living, there are not to shove anyone in the fire, and they can only light the fire after all of the fireworks have been set off. All in all, it seems they should be able to stay out of trouble, but it's kinda obvious that they will find some loophole in what Lorian's said that will create mischief.
Or at least, they will if they've not matured since the fireworks display we tried to have on bank holiday, when Matt and Dillon tied Marduke to a stake after finding Lorian's discarded matches. They tossed the burning matches at the monster chanting: "Burn the witch! Burn the witch!" No-one had the heart to tell them that Marduke wasn't a witch on the basis that he's a guy – a horribly deformed and ugly guy, I will admit – but still a guy. Marduke was lucky they had yet to discover the wonders of petrol.
"I know!" Dillon says, grinning like an excited five year old. "There's only an hour and a half to go!"
"An hour and a half is a very long time. Besides," I add with allowing the corners of my mouth to curve upwards in a smile. "We probably won't start with the fireworks 'til six or seven."
Dillon's face falls and he throws himself on to the sofa with his arms folded, pouting. "S'not fair." He mutters.
"Time can be odd. It flies when you're having fun or are distracted and crawls by when you're bored." I state, plonking myself on the sofa beside him, biting back my laughter.
"Life's not fair." Dillon replies stubbornly.
"It is fair." I explain. "Fairer than death."
He can't help but crack a smile at this remark; it's something he said to me when I was training. Let's just say that it was one heck of a day!
With that, He runs off outside, calling to Matt as he leaves.
Sighing, I carry myself upstairs to find Ethan. Rochelle's taken Neriah and Isabel into town, shopping. Lathenia drove them so she's not here either. Really, I want to employ his cunning mind in to helping me think of ways to prank the Sue. In the pranking business, Ethan's the best. Not only does he have the greatest talents for that field with his skill of illusions, he's used it to develop a keen understanding of the best pranks to use.
I knock on the door to his room and judging by the loud bang that comes from the other side of the door, he hadn't been expecting me.
"It's Kyla. Let me in."
The door swings open with no Ethan behind it. He's lying on his bed on his stomach scribbling franticly in a blue notebook. I raise my eyebrows at him before remembering that his second skill is that of animation. His other ones are illusions and instinct. Lucky devil! He's got three!
The door closes behind me and Ethan speaks without looking up. "You want to prank Neriah, yes?"
"Have you been reading my thoughts?" I snap, completely forgetting that he couldn't have even if he wanted to.
"I'm not a truthseer." He says, finally looking up to meet my gaze with those bright blue eyes of his. "I guessed. That's why I didn't hide this." He gestures to his notebook. "I'm planning a prank on Neriah."
I grin evilly. "Then I'm all ears."
He follows my example with the grin. "I thought you'd say that. Now I've persuaded Rochelle and Isabel to get her out of the way so that I can set up then we can all have a good laugh at her expense." He makes Neriah's camera – the same one she filmed the events of Halloween on – zoom into my hands. "If you want to be involved then set that up for me while I tell you my plan."
As he explains exactly what he plans to do, I set about attempting to work the camera. It takes a lot of concentration but somehow, I manage to hear it all and set up the camera. I set it down on the bed as he finishes his explanation.
"Well?" He enquires. "What do you think?"
"It's simple, yet effective sounding." I answer. "It should work just fine."
"DINNER! NOW!" Lorian's voice echoes over to us up the stairs.
Ethan shoves the camera in his pillow out of sight before we both go downstairs to eat our tea of takeaway Chinese. Ethan and I are, surprisingly, the first at the table but it doesn't take long for Matt to arrive, followed by Dillon almost immediately.
"Fire! Fire! Fiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiirrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrreeeeeeeeee!" He sings, doing a full knee slide to reach his space at the table. "Ooh! Chinese!"
I giggle. "Dillon, you scare me sometimes."
"Is it a crime to be happy?" He retorts, still grinning under his attempt to look hurt.
I answer. "No, but when you're happy, you scare everyone with your strangeness."
"-and your dodgy singing." Ethan adds.
"Hey!" Dillon protests. "My singing's not that bad!"
I laugh. Matt doesn't get it for a moment then he falls off his chair, shaking with laughter and starts to choke on a bit of spare rib.
Ethan thumps Matt on the back. "Matt, it wasn't that funny."
Matt sends the bone he just choked on flying into the wall. It bounces off, whacking Dillon on the shoulder.
"No-one loves me!" Dillon cries, wiping Matt's spit mixed with sweet and sour sauce off his T-shirt.
Lorian sighs. "Matt, you are not supposed to eat the bone; you are supposed to eat the meat around it. Bones are not edible."
Matt shrugs, stuffing a handful of prawn crackers in his mouth. I roll my eyes. Why is it that Matt has no table manners? I had to teach Dillon some; I don't want to teach Matt too! Matt's brain is like a sieve! Even Dillon's beats it! It seems that Ethan is the only guy in this house that comes with ready-learned table manners. There's Lorian as well but he's not a guy or a girl. He's a thing. Wait a minute! What if he's a robot! That would explain everything! It explains why he's of mo fixed sex and why he has table manners! They were programmed into him! There are only two ways to find out: search his room and ask him. The former seems like a better idea 'cause he might lie, but I'm lazy and I can't be bothered to plan the search or do it so it looks like I'm just going to have to ask.
"Lorian? Are you a robot?"
The immortal/ robot, I'm not sure which yet, spits out his drink in to the cup. "Am I a what?" He questions.
"Are you a robot? You know, a person-shaped machine?" I explain.
"No!" He laughs. "Whatever gave you that idea?"
"You have table manners and you refer to yourself in the masculine." I explain.
Lorian nods slowly. "Okay then… that makes no sense whatsoever. Besides, Ethan has table manners."
"I know but Ethan has been taught by Isabel."
"FIREWORKS!" Dillon yells as the noise of the door opening reaches us. He stuffs the last of his food in his mouth with his hands and rushes outside. Clearly, I need to spend more time on the table manners thing where there is fire concerned.
"What?" Matt asks, chasing after Dillon with food still in his mouth.
I share a look of disgust with Ethan before he smirks and shovels the last of his food in his mouth with a spoon. Sure it's not perfect table manners but at least he ate with cutlery. He rushes off to sort our prank on Neriah. Finishing my food with a knife and fork – see, at least one of us has some table manners – I rush off upstairs to put the camera in position, running into Rochelle on my way out of the kitchen.
I try to look casual as I enter Ethan's room and pull the camera out of his pillow case. I hide it in the pocket of my hoodie. Once I get outside, I place it out of the way, hidden in a tree like Ethan and I decided. That was the easy bit, everyone's too distracted by the pretty patterns the fireworks are making in the sky.
Dillon and Matt are so exited by the though of the bonfire afterwards and the fact that they actually get fireworks, their noises of appreciation are enough to near deafen me.
"OOOOOOH!" Dillon calls as a particularly loud bang gives way to an explosion of purples and whites.
"AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!" Matt adds as a large green one lights up the sky.
I take my place beside Dillon. I just can't help but smile as I notice Ethan with his arm round Rochelle. She's leaning into him, gazing up at the sky. Those two just make such a great couple. They really do.
Everyone is thoroughly enjoying watching the fireworks. Lathenia's not even bothered as Lorian lights them all with a set off matched rather than with his powers which are much more reliable and safe. Even Neriah's watching the patterns in the sky rather than Marduke, who is grunting his approval at the display beside Lathenia.
"Aren't they pretty?" I call into Dillon's ear over the racket as I watch a red one cross paths with a blue one.
"Yeah! They rock!" He shouts back. "I can't wait 'til the bonfire!"
"I know you can't! What's wrong with just enjoying this display first?"
"Nothing! That's what I'm doing now! OOOOOOOOOOOOH!"
"WOW!" I yell as the light makes a colourful sparkling rainbow. This must be near the end of the display. We've used up all the mortal fireworks; Lorian stands next to his sister weaving patterns with his hands while staring up at the light patterns he's created.
"I KNOW!" Dillon agrees as a horse as white as snow gallops around the sky, swooping down so low over us that Neriah and Lathenia duck. Matt ducks too but his duck is a bit of a delayed reaction.
Another rainbow appears and the horse canters towards it, splitting into two horses which turn into unicorns. I gasp as their manes and tails turn a golden colour and their horns take on all the colours of the rainbow and more besides. They both leap over the rainbow and swerve towards us.
"They look so real!" I exclaim. "And so beautiful!"
The unicorns come much lower than the horse did, hovering mere inches away from the ground, barely feet away from us. They do indeed look too real to be true. I can see the single golden hairs in their tails and white ones on their bodies. Those horns shimmer brilliantly as the pair take off again, over to the rainbow where different coloured swans emerge. There are red ones, green ones, orange ones, yellow ones, purple ones, blue ones, sliver ones, bronze ones and gold ones! They stream across the sky forming weird and wonderful shapes as they do so. I recognise a boat and a bow.
"Amazing!" Dillon states.
The swans fly in a spiral, then is an explosion of all the different coloured light and unicorn, swan and rainbow are nowhere to be seen.
With the end of the display falls silence until Matt speaks.
"Can we do this next year?"
Lorian smiles. "I don't see why not. Come on Lathenia, let's go inside. We have much shopping to unpack." He winks as Lathenia leads him indoors, followed by Marduke.
Matt and Dillon share a wicked grin. Dillon punches the air. "BONFIRE! Matt, get the Guy!"
I giggle; those pair of big kids had spent all morning digging out old clothes so they could stuff them with straw and grass to make a perfect Guy. Honestly, these pair actually act younger that their shoe size!
Matt returns with the Guy draped over his shoulders. He and Dillon climb the humongous pile of wood that Lathenia miraculously failed to notice. They attach the Guy to a large wooden stake protruding from the centre of the pile then leap off.
Rochelle lights a match form the box that Lorian left behind, tossing it into the pile. The fire flares up so quickly that we all have to jump back to avoid being burnt by it.
"Matt?" Neriah questions, wearing a falsely generated smile. "Exactly how much petrol did you pour over this wood?"
"Oh only a lot." Matt replies, unable to remember how much petrol he and Dillon poured on it between them. I could tell her that they used a container each but it's her problem if she wasn't here to know.
Dillon is enjoying the burning of the guy thoroughly. "Ha! Ha! Ha! Look at him! His head's burning! Hee! Hee! Ha! Ha! Ha!"
Matt spins around to look. "Wow! It is! Ha! He has no hair anymore!"
Dillon adds. "We didn't give him any hair."
"Oh." Matt says. "His nose just burnt off!"
"He had no nose either." Dillon explains.
"Well something burnt off!"
"That was his hand."
"Oh."
We watch the guy until his hat has gone, then Dillon declares that he will stroke the fire so it stays going. He produces a steel rod from the back door then runs back to the fire with it.
"I wanna poke it too!" Matt calls in his over-exited state.
Dillon pokes a log at the bottom of the pile before handing the rod to Matt. "You can only poke it if you give me back the poke-y thing afterwards."
Matt's features scream delight. He's giggling like a little kid whose been given a heck of a lot of sugar and has just been offered more sugar. Actually, that sound more like Isabel with sugar but hey! This is Matt with fire.
Two things happen instantly: Matt stabs the logs with the steel rod too hard and the burning logs fall in a mini avalanche of burning stuff. The fire, enrages by the petrol, spreads rapidly, trapping Neriah on against the wall. Arkarian pulls me and Isabel back before the flames reach us. We slam into Ethan and Rochelle by mistake but I'm just glad we weren't caught in the middle of that.
"Isabel realises. "I can't see Dillon and my brother!"
"They must be buried under all that!" Arkarian discovers sadly.
"I know they're annoying but they don't deserve that!" I wail, hugging Isabel.
"HELLO!" Neriah yells. "What about me? I don't deserve to die either!" She's pressed against the wall, watching the flames creep closer with a look of horror on her face.
"Yeah you do." Rochelle answers.
"SAVE ME!" Neriah sobs.
Ethan sighs, returning from the back door with a fire extinguisher. "Oh all right then. I will once I find Matt and Dillon." He sprints to the flames and begins to spray them, clearing a path to where Matt and Dillon were last sighted. I grab another fire extinguisher from just inside the back door, aiming the white foam at the trail Ethan has just cleared to keep it open for his return.
Ethan's journey is slow and yet the foam of the fire extinguishers doesn't run out all the time Ethan presses on. Throughout all this, the flames creep closer to Neriah so that they are no more than an inch away from her clothes. Her eyes are screwed shut as she screams herself hoarse. She opens one eye to check Ethan's progress through the flames, spotting Isabel, Arkarian and Rochelle watching anxiously and myself wielding the fire extinguisher behind Ethan.
The flames flare up to her face. She lets out a bloodcurdling shriek.
Then it all stops. The flames disappear. The logs return to their previous positions below the burning Guy. And there, sitting together on the grass, flicking used matches at each other's faces are Matt and Dillon.
But Neriah, whose eyes are still screwed shut and whose mouth is still screaming, fails to notice. I grin evilly, noticing that my fire extinguisher wasn't a part of Ethan's illusion; I spray foam in her face.
The screaming stops abruptly. I can almost hear the cogs in Neriah's brain piecing things together. Her jaw drops and she spins to face Ethan, who, like everyone else, is in hysterics. "THIS WAS AN ILLUSION!"
"Yep!" Ethan answers.
Neriah's eyes scan the rest of us laughing named. "You were all in on this?" She demands.
"Uh huh!" I reply.
"I though I was going to die! It's not funny! I hate you! I HATE YOU ALL!" She storms inside.
I applaud Ethan, everyone except Matt, who is still laughing at his girlfriend, his protectiveness of her having been temporarily disengaged by the bonfire, follows suit. "Bravo Ethan! That was one good illusion!"
Ethan bows. "I was just doing my duty to prank Neriah on every special occasion."
Isabel laughs. "I think I actually believed it for a moment there!"
"Good." Ethan states as the last of the Guy disintegrates into ash.
"Awwwwwwwww!" Dillon and Matt cry in unison. They stare at the ashes of their Guy for a moment before Dillon stands up.
"So," he says. "Shall we go inside and celebrate the burning of our Guy with some cheese?"
I smile. "I couldn't have said it better myself." Remembering the camera I hid earlier, I fish it out of the tree. "Shall we watch our prank while we do so?"
"Heck yeah!" Rochelle answers. "I wanna see how scare the Sue was!"
"So do us all, Rochelle." Arkarian adds. "So do us all."
AN: Okay, I actually started this on bonfire night but I've had so much homework and drama rehearsals that I haven't had a chance to post it! Sorry! Anyway, it's actually quite long for me to fit in one chapter. I think I will do a Christmas one too. Hopefully that one will be a little early rather than late.
Anyway, thanks to all the people who reviewed the Halloween one and anyone who chooses to review this, Thanks also to the people who've read this.
Please review :-p