Jesse wasn't sure how to feel about the giant (well, he wasn't really a giant, but to someone of their stature it wasn't a far stretch) currently carrying them on his back.
Axel was really quite friendly and... okay, he was a tiny bit hyper. He'd almost insisted on carrying Jesse, plopping them on his shoulders and then taking off at a dead run like a horse.
(Jesse had nearly fallen off, to Lukas's horror and Petra's slight amusement and mostly horror.)
At least he was letting Jesse huddle onto him now as he led the way to the giant tower with a spire blown out. It was like hugging a teddy bear. Especially with the flannel.
Man, the flannel was cozy. Jesse half-wished they had their own, but the fuzzy jacket had an appeal.
He was chatting cheerfully to the October Children as they strolled– something about Magnus having helped him make a firework display recently for the town's celebration of something– Jesse couldn't catch it.
Boom Town was interesting. They were still shaky, but they peeped around at all of the ruined buildings. Most of them were still intact, or as intact as they could be, with huge holes blasted in the walls and sections of the roof splintered and broken.
There were very few people simply sitting around– Jesse saw one person running after another toting sticks of lit dynamite and yelling at him, there was another throwing chicken eggs at people (Isa scowled at that), and another who almost singed Mevia's robe with a well-tossed stick of dynamite.
It looked a little like a country town– or something from the Old West with taller buildings, except half blown-to-bits and very disorganized besides.
They'd gotten a good portion of the way to the spire, in a small area ringed by houses and pitted with craters, when someone stepped in front of Axel, making him come to a rather abrupt halt.
"Heya big guy. How you doin'?"
Jesse peeked over Axel's shoulder as unobtrusively as possible. A girl with hair that was dyed dark blue shifted to her right, one hand on her hip as she grinned at Axel from behind her mask. Her front tooth had a big chip in it, and her red eyes glinted as she took in the group. Three lords, the October Children, Petra...
Her eyes raised to Axel's and Jesse hastily shrank away.
The last thing they needed was to be found out as a human.
Axel's pleasant smile fell, and he gave a long-suffering sigh. "Sorry, Nohr, I'm busy."
"Yeah, escortin' three lords and the friggin October Children. Plus you got a kid on your back," Nohr said casually, flailing her hand carelessly at the lords and in Jesse's direction.
They shrank down more.
Mevia rolled her eyes. "Yes, because it's customary to escort a lord to their new location. It's being polite. You should try it sometime," she snarked back.
Isa covered her mouth, looking like she was politely coughing, but when she removed her hand her lips were curved up into a grin.
"Oh yeah? And I guess it's customary to usher 'round the October Children and the August Girl, too. Invite 'em over for tea, too." Nohr burst into derisive laughter. "Nah, dude, we kinda wanna have some fun. Never griefed a lord before."
Aiden's hand tightened on the handle of his whip protectively. "You think you can seriously get the upper hand on the three lords who are basically connected mentally?" He scoffed, shaking his head. "You're really in over your head."
Nohr just smiled and mock-politely gestured around her. "Well, not by myself, obviously. But people can only handle a certain amount of numbers..."
Slowly, as if on cue, several griefers had turned to look at them. Almost the entire city, about fifty in the small space and certainly more beyond the area they were in, were starting to creep up on the roofs and edge around the corners, looking at the small group.
"And I'm willin' to bet that we've got more than enough to overwhelm three lords," Nohr finished, sneering.
Harper gave a derisive snort at that.
Axel was signing something at the others, the same three fingerspelled letters over and over and over again.
Jesse took a second to decipher the clumsy finger-spelling. Nurm seemed to have some trouble too, but Axel was doing it behind his back and upside-down anyways, so it wasn't the best finger-spelling.
R... v... n. No, that wasn't a v, that was a rather clumsy u...
Run.
"Run." Jack muttered, the moment he'd deciphered the fingerspelling.
"What? No, we can handle it–" Aiden started to protest it.
"Not in a space that feels like a sardine can," Jack cut him off tersely, gesturing at the narrow space around them.
Petra still looked like she might protest the decision, and Maya started to protest herself. They could handle it, it was just a fight, they'd been in several fights on the way here–
"RUN!" Jack roared at them in a voice that brooked absolutely no room for argument.
Sure, maybe the lords could handle it, Jack could handle it, heck, even Petra and the October Children, but after a day or two of travelling– and Radar coming along besides, and him not being the best at fighting– they didn't want extra people getting in the way, especially when over fifty people were coming at them in a tight space.
That's like cramming a few extra fish into a chock-full barrel and hoping that the barrel didn't start to crack under the pressure.
Nobody had to wait for him to repeat it again before they all turned tail and scattered, except for the lords– and Jesse, since they were stuck on Axel's back.
There were several shouts, a few laughs and jeers at the fleeing October Children, the griefers attempting to follow the October Children– until Axel cracked his knuckles.
If Jesse could see his smile, they might've shrunk away. But the griefers certainly did, and it was enough to make them all pause for a moment.
It was not the friendly smile he'd been giving Jesse, the one of a boy (man? Demon?) who was patient and friendly and kind and, honestly, kind of a goof.
No, it was the kind of smile that made you realize that you'd messed up in challenging someone.
Bad.
"Been a while since I've been out of the safe zone long enough to get in a scrap."
A/N: Well, Axel and the lords are gonna have... fun. xD
My costume's coming along well, but dang, I have to use a LOT of glitter for it xD I hope I can get more of it done this week.
I updated the cover for October Children! Never drawn a cover for this story despite the fact I really loved it, so here it is.
RQTC: I'm thinking about starting a little thing at the end of each chapter like an omake. An omake is basically a bonus; you basically get to see the 'bloopers' of scenes. For example, you would see bloopers of lines, things I wrote jokingly and then deleted, or bloopers like it was a movie. One per chapter. What do you guys think?
I am a phone. Reviews are my charge. I'm charged. xD
Responses to reviews!
Toni42: Yeeee :3 / Hehehehe, you're the cutest bear x3 / They do their best. :3 / Oof, yeah xD /Ack xD
bungaMawar001: Yep! They're back for real now, I think. / Hehe xD / Yes, it's new! It was fun to draw xD
Northern Goshawk: Yeah; but if an actual siren came up Jesse'd be gone. The siren would sing about stuff like... I dunno, cooking or pasta or something and Jesse'd be like "ooh yeah." xD xD / I see what you did there ;P / He's... trying, I guess xD / Yeah, that was fun! It wasn't intentional but I liked the way it happened, haha. / I'm really glad you enjoy it!
Guest: He's doing a lot to help, haha. / Yeah, it kinda sucks they're in such bad shape. Good thing they're here, I guess. / Well, the others aren't letting THAT happen again. xD / Thank you! I'm glad you like it. :)
TheAmberShadow: Yeah, he's kind of oblivious xD / Demons don't exactly have therapy unfortunately xD / Yeah, they especially need it since... well, it's Boom Town xD / Axel's surprisingly sneaky hehe / He is. / That's cool! Mine... uses a lot of paint and glitter. xD / It's not two bad, as long as you don't mind a lot of three puns. I'm four-cing us to continue this, I hope you don't mind and six around for a while.
Happygoluckymegami: Those all sound fun! I hope you have fun being Cassie. Bonus, you could also make a white pumpkin mask... though that would take forever. xD
Darkbeast Dend: Glad you're enjoying the story. :)
That's all for now! See ya, so long, and g'bye!
x.X. A.L. X.x
