Leftover Alphabet Soup

A/N: Hooray writing marathons. If this doesn't prepare us for NaNo, I don't know what will.

Oh yeah, I meant to put this at the beginning of R: I actually have a legitimate excuse for being so late. I had swine flu. No, really, I actually did. But I didn't die (obviously), and no one in my family died, even though we all got it, so it's all okay.

Disclaimer: I refuse.

T is for: Tattletale
By Tassel630

"MAAAAAAAAAX!"

I groaned. "What did he do now, Angel?" I shouted down the hallway.

"GAZZY PUT CHILI IN MY BED!"

I walked into Angel's room, and then was strongly compelled to walk right back out. The Gasman hadn't just put chili in Angel's bed. The Gasman had entirely drowned all of her worldly possessions in chili. Every stuffed animal, every cozy blanket and gauzy curtain of Angel's corner, was covered in it. Angel stood ankle-deep in the middle of it all, wailing.

I kind of wanted to join her wailing, because it was a mess. But that's not what a leader does, so instead I waded over to her and picked her up. She started sniffling and wiping her eyes as I carried her to the kitchen, already containing herself.

I set her on the counter next to the sink and started peeling her chili-bloated socks off of her feet. "It's okay, Angel, he's going to have to clean it all up himself. I'll make sure everything is spick and span."

She nodded morosely, still sniffling.

I left her to wash her own feet – three is old enough for that, right? – and went Gasman-hunting. He was sitting on his windowsill, dangling his legs out of the open window. I guess a normal child wouldn't be allowed to perch so precariously in a window suspended above a steep gorge, but'cha know – the wings thing sort of eliminates the fear of falling.

"Gazzy."

He jumped, banged his head on the bottom of the open window, and nearly fell out. I caught him by the back of his jacket.

"I hope you're prepared for some serious cleaning, my friend. Angel is sleeping in her own bed tonight, and I expect it to be entirely chili-free, as well as complete with all of her possessions, also free of any sort of food, slime, or explosive. You have five hours. Go."

He looked up at me innocently for a moment, trying to persuade me to change my mind with his wide blue eyes. It was lucky he gave up when he did, because I almost gave in and agreed to help, but then his face crumpled into irritation and he slouched out without a word.

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"MAAAAAAAAAAAX!"

"What now, Angel?"

"There are cornea-floaties in the bathtub!"

"…cornea-floaties?"

"Yeah, you know the long skinny floaty things you get in your eyes when you look at something white? Actually, these look a little like tapeworms."

THAT made me anxious. I burst into the bathroom to find Angel wrapped in a towel, pointing at a bathtub filled with spaghetti. Well, at least it wasn't tapeworms. Come to think of it, I wasn't sure how Angel had gotten to the age of three and gained knowledge of both corneas and tapeworms, but she didn't recognize spaghetti. Perhaps we ought to watch the Food Network more often.

Anyway.

"Gas-MAN!" I shouted to the house in general. He came running up the hallway from his room so immediately that I half-expected him to jump to salute.

"Care to explain this?" I asked, pointing at the bathtub.

He looked at it for a moment. "Maybe the drain was hungry," he suggested, smiling weakly.

I wasn't amused. "Alright, Gasman, I'm done. I'm sick of you pulling all of these pranks on Angel! I'm okay with an occasional joke, but this is ridiculous, and targeting only your little sister is unacceptable! Honestly, this is the ninth time this week, and it's only Wednesday! I swear, if I hear my name being screamed through this house in that elongated, accusatory manner because you put cockroaches in Angel's underwear or something, I will build a freaking labyrinth under this house, kick your skinny butt into it, and you can fight the Minotaur!" He probably had never heard of the Minotaur, but that was okay. It sounded threatening.

He looked threatened. Actually, he looked a little bit like he might collapse into a puddle of quivering goo. The kid was only five.

"I was just doing it to get back at her because she keeps tattling on me!" he wailed.

I kneeled down to his height. "Gazzy, don't you think that if you stopped pranking her, she'd stop tattling?"

He blinked. "Oh – well, yeah. I mean, I guess that would work."

I shook my head and ruffled his hair. "Alright, just don't do it again. And do something with all this spaghetti."

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"MAAAAAAAX!"

I slammed my book shut. "GASMAN!" I roared, crashing into Angel's room in rage.

"I didn't do it!" he screamed, running in after me.

I looked around at Angel, who was sitting serenely on her bed. "What did he do now?"

She smiled sweetly. "Oh, he didn't actually do anything this time. I just wanted to hear what his punishment would be."

A/N: Ninja C, you have Ultimate Unicorns. You threw it at us during that m'n'm… thingy we had, and now I'm throwing it back at you. Ha.