The Spring Festival Celebration
A/N: Yay! Chapter two! I'll try to finish by Easter—I didn't realize how little time I had left. Now…you reviewers said stuff. My turn to say stuff back.
Midnight C: If the Djinn ran around loose in the game, the world would be far less concerned with the lighthouses and Babi would be ordering his people to invent pesticide. And Picard's not sure he'll go to your party after you ZAPPED him…but I promised no revenge, I suppose. The GSC goes on…
Alex: Would it be my story without Picard? (I don't even read it in the game as 'Piers'. My eyes see 'Picard' in place of the word Piers.)
Jupiter Girl: How much chaos? A lesson for the future—never ask me that, or the chaos will multiply. Read on…you'll see just how much chaos eight Adepts can cause.
VI: Have fun reading this one. And tell Triad to come read it!
Part Two: Preparations, Adept Style
"I beat you fair and square, Garet," Ivan said.
"In your dreams, maybe," Garet replied hotly. He, Ivan, Felix and Isaac were busy hunting through his attic for the Spring Festival decorations.
"You do realize we've got to hang all this stuff, right?" Isaac asked wearily. He'd been hanging, sweeping, polishing and scrubbing since early that morning—around the holidays, Dora became a neat freak. Since she was busy cooking, mostly dessert, Isaac had to do all the cleaning work.
"Most of it doesn't hang, actually," Garet said. "A lot of it is this." He held up a pastel-yellow basket. There were several of varying light colors in the box behind him. "That's where Mia, Jenna and Sheba went. Flowers go in the baskets."
"And what about Picard?" Ivan asked, slightly annoyed that the Lemurian may have been shirking his duties.
"He said he had something planned, but he wouldn't say what it was," Isaac replied, lifting down a box from the top of a stack. "Look at this—colored dye."
"Likely just finding a way to avoid work," Garet grumbled.
"Colored dye?" Ivan asked. "What for?"
"To color the eggs with. Even I remember that," Felix said. "Eggs. We need to get those too."
"You do remember that year, when mom sent me to get the eggs, and I came home looking like the chickens' next meal?" Garet asked. "I have no desire to live through that again."
"Then Felix and I will do it," Isaac said. Felix gave him a look that said you volunteered me? Isaac only shrugged. "Get into the holiday spirit. It's good for you."
"Not if our chickens are still that aggressive."
"Yes, but you have Psynergy, Felix."
"Shut up, Isaac."
"Boys, boys," said Mia's voice from the bottom of the stairs. "Stop acting like little children and bring those things down here!"
"Yes sir, captain, sir," Ivan mocked.
"Better watch
it or I'll go find Picard."
"And what will he do?"
"Set four of his Djinn."
"Shutting up."
The four boys hoisted the boxes and slowly began to bring them down the stairs. Ivan and Garet had no real problems, atypical for them, but true. Isaac carried two boxes, and so was unsteady and much slower, but in the end he set his load down with a relieved sigh.
Felix, however, wasn't so lucky. He could not see over the top of his stack, and his foot missed a step, sending him tumbling forward, boxes and all. There were several crash, crack, and thud sounds, followed by a loud thunk and a soft groan. Now residing at the bottom of the stairs was what appeared to be several ribbons, a few shattered glass objects, hanging decorations, and two boxes, with a Venus Adept trapped beneath it all.
"Felix!" Jenna cried. She dropped the large basket of spring flowers she carried and joined Isaac, Garet and Mia in pulling the pile off him.
"Felix?" Isaac asked. Felix looked up at him, noted Isaac's single raised eyebrow, and nodded. "Good. You sure pick the best ways to almost ruin the holiday."
"Oh, yes, that boosted my ego," Felix said dryly as Isaac and Garet pulled him up.
"It doesn't need one, brother," Jenna said. "Hey—wasn't Ivan here?"
"Barely a second ago," Mia confirmed. "I was…rather preoccupied. I didn't see where he went."
The random chorus of voices yelling "Ivan!" soon enough brought him running, though he would have rather continued his hunt for the elusive Lemurian, whom he thought he'd seen headed towards Vale's plaza a second ago.
"What?" Ivan asked irritably. He met with several intense gazes, most notably that of Felix. Ivan blinked for a moment—Felix looked somehow different. It may have been the stray pieces of straw in his hair, though.
"Come on. We have decorations and such to deal with." Garet took the opportunity to begin dragging Ivan along by the arm, and though he didn't appreciate it one bit, they were heading for the plaza. I will know what that Lemurian is up to, Ivan thought.
Following this were hours of climbing on rooftops, up into trees, and up cliff walls for various forms of decorating. Needless to say, at the end of it all one found five very tired Adepts and two who seemed as though they could have run five miles and still not worn out. Those two were, of course, Ivan and Sheba.
Thus it was these two who were selected to get the eggs. It was a Spring Festival tradition in Vale to paint eggs with colored dye and then hide them around Vale, and whoever got the most eggs won a giant basket of chocolate. This was, of course, enough to send Garet into a sugar high frenzy and have enough left for several weeks of continued frenzy.
"Ivan, we've got a problem," Sheba said. "I've only got four eggs."
"That's alright. I put most of mine in that basket over there, and I've got five more." Defying the proverb that so obviously stated otherwise, Sheba and Ivan put all their eggs in one basket. Not only that, but as they searched one more time for any remaining eggs, they neglected to watch their basket.
There was a screeching sound, followed by the barking of a dog, and said dog almost instantly chased a cat right under Ivan and Sheba's feet. Sheba, not anticipating the cat's flight up onto her shoulders, fell face-first right onto the basket of eggs. Even if she hadn't, the dog soon joined her, and would have landed on the eggs themselves if she hadn't been in the way. As it was, the eggs were crushed further beneath Sheba.
"Ivan, we have a larger problem."
"Messier, too," Ivan said as he helped Sheba up, the two of them looking forlornly at what, in the sun on a hot day, would have become a fried egg large enough to feed most of Vale.
"What are we going to tell the others?" Sheba asked worriedly.
"We won't have to," Ivan said. "They will look at your clothes and know the answer."
Meanwhile, Mia, Isaac, and Jenna were busy hanging wreathes of flowers off of everything that could have something hung from it. There were also various shards of crystal stuck onto just about every decoration in such a way that they would catch the sunlight and reflect it into a myriad of rainbow colors.
"This certainly does add a spark to the day!" Jenna said happily. When a Mars Djinni appeared in the air beside her, she groaned. "Not you Spark, I meant spark like a bright point."
"Oops. Sorry," Spark said in a high voice, disappearing again. Jenna sighed. She climbed down the ladder she was using and set it down flat on the ground. "Alright, Mia, why is that faraway look on your face?"
"I'm wondering what's taking Ivan and Sheba so long," she said. "And also what in the name of Mercury Picard could be doing that's so important. Aside from playing that flute of his—don't think I don't hear it." Indeed, if Jenna listened, she could hear the sounds of the flute, but they were soft, and might have been the wind.
"Everyone's so out of it today," Isaac said. "Something wrong with the Spring Festival?"
"I've never been to one before," Mia said. "Spring is short in Imil, barely different from winter. More rain and less snow, basically. We don't usually celebrate anything."
"You don't celebrate the day when the green of springtime descends upon the world?" Felix asked, arriving with Garet, both of them carrying a large table between them.
"Imil spring is rather brown and grey, actually. Not much green." Mia watched as Felix and Garet set the table down, Garet's brother and sister following them with a long bench.
"I guess you'll have a big dinner here?" Picard had come up behind Mia and Jenna, surprising them both, and as the former jumped, the latter spun and swung the first thing she had grabbed, which ended up being the staff she had leaned against the building as she decorated it.
"Jenna!" Isaac said loudly, and Picard, rather surprised himself, jumped backwards as the sharp edge of the wooden staff sliced into his shirtsleeve.
"Sheesh, Jenna. At least warn me when you're going to start practicing sudden-swinging staff combat!" he said, looking at the tear in his sleeve warily. "That thing is sharp."
"Where have you been all day?" Felix asked in a half-angry way.
"Nowhere in particular," Picard replied in an increasingly annoying habit of giving away everything and yet nothing at all. "I've got something planned for your Spring Festival."
"How was it in Lemuria?" Mia asked.
"We never had one, that I can remember. Or if we did, we did different things. This is nice, though. Everyone's going to get together just to celebrate a new season."
"Things get planted the day after," Isaac said with a groan. "More work under the hot sun." He seemed about to go on but for the arrival of Ivan and Sheba. Ivan, looking rather nervous, carried a basket that was covered in something runny and off-white. Sheba seemed to have this same liquid splattered all over her front and her face.
"Sheba? Ivan? What's going on?" Felix asked.
"They put all their eggs in the same basket," Picard said, as if that was explanation enough. Ivan and Sheba nodded glumly.
"And somehow all the eggs ended up being…flattened?" Isaac asked with the most anger anyone had ever heard him use. "The villagers will kill me."
"We don't have eggs?" Garet asked, a grin spreading on his face.
"I hardly think that's cause for excitement," Jenna said bitterly.
"No, no, it's alright. I have an idea!" Ignoring several surprised and skeptical looks, Garet went on and told them his plan. When he was finished, Isaac groaned.
"Bane is going to kill me," he moaned helplessly.
(*_*) (*_*) (*_*) (*_*) (*_*) (*_*)
"Isaac, I'm going to kill you!" Bane screamed. Luff, Torch and Dew appeared to roll their eyes.
"It's not so bad," Dew said, looking rather good as a white Djinni with blue spots. Torch agreed, being a bright yellow with red stripes. Even Luff, almost as bad-tempered as Bane, seemed to be enjoying himself. He was a dark purple with swirls of white.
"I am hot pink!" Bane yelled. "Isaac is going to die a slow death of poisoning!"
"Not likely," Sheba said, grinning happily. "Now stop complaining or I will give you purple spots."
"PURPLE?!" Bane roared. Isaac chose that exact moment to walk in, rather aghast at the noise.
"Perhaps I'd better stay outside," he said. "Bane, before you end up hurting Sheba or Jenna or anyone in this household, consider the fact that it was Garet's idea. And no, that was not permission to give him a slow death by poisoning."
Garet's idea had indeed been to paint the Djinn in place of the eggs, and the majority of them had been all for it. Only Bane, Squall and Fizz had been against it, but neither Fizz nor Squall had screamed and hollered thus.
"It isn't so bad," said Sap, who was also pink, though a lighter shade. "I mean…seventy-two is an awful lot of eggs, or even Djinn posing as eggs. There is a chance that no one will ever find you, and you can go jump in some river tomorrow."
Bane responded with incoherent muttering the likes of which most Djinn weren't expected to know.
Sheba giggled, washing the colored dye out of the bowls it had been in, as the Djinn jumped into the basket that had previously held eggs and Jenna took them to the mayor with their proposition. Garet went with her—he was the mayor's grandson, after all.
Picard had mysteriously disappeared yet again, but the work yet to be done had lessened considerably. Isaac and the others were finished by the time Garet and Jenna returned. Both of them were grinning.
"I suppose the mayor agreed," Felix said casually. They nodded. "Well…good…it wouldn't be Spring Festival without eggs."
"Djinn," Ivan and Sheba said together.
"Whatever."
**************************************************
Vil: Chapter three better be done fast…Easter's around the
corner! Hope you liked this one! Happy early Easter!
Kaede: Sí, sí. Felices Pascuas!
Norli: and a happy new yea…wait…wrong holiday.
Avaria: Can we hide the Djinn now?
Picard: Vil, you trapped me with these…these…
Vil: *huggles Picard* You're the best Easter present yet!
Picard: *gasps* Vil…too tight…
