Summary: Foop is a baby in jail; Caudwell is a therapist who begins to notice some oddities in his behavior and mental development.

Characters: Foop, Hiccup, Caudwell, Jorgen

Rating: K

Prerequisites: None

Posted: August 18, 2016

80. Hidden (Two weeks after "Anti-Poof")

Friday June 26th - July 5th, "2008"

Year of Breath; Summer of the Frozen Planet

"Might I ask, exactly how necessary was it for me to put on the black lipstick?"

"I like it when we wear the stripes of war paint on our cheeks!"

Thin wings crinkled. "Yes, sir. You wear them well. Thank you for sharing your supply with me. So, you keep him hidden all the way at the back of this passage?"

"Yes. He is the most dangerous prisoner we currently have in all of Abracatraz, small square-head." The key twisted in one of the locks. A beaded curtain fluttered amidst clicking and clacking. Kitnut wood, broken seashells, nicked glass, and cheap plastic. Foop picked up another purple crayon and ignored it. Instead, he riveted his focus on the approaching figures. One of those voices belonged to Jarhead Jorgen, of course; he was Keeper of Da Rules and all that; a large muscular fellow who always seemed to juggle ten additional jobs if ever his rule-break pager wasn't beeping at his wrist. Judge, jury, and warden and, potentially, maybe even executioner.

The second figure was one that Foop couldn't yet put a claw to. Granted, there were probably at least a hundred beings in the universe he didn't know as he was, after all, only thirteen days old. He just knew he'd never met this one.

The pulsing signal that Jorgen inadvertently released into the magical energy field gleamed like suns against rocky moons. Full of drumbeats, police car sirens, smashed bricks tumbling to the pavement, clashing silverware- the storm of it gave the little anti-fairy an ouchy headache.

But that second pulse was smaller. It sounded different. Light. Hovering. Buzzing. Fluttery- that was the exact word his thin blue hand had been grasping for. The small figure sounded like a thumb zipping across a stack of post-it notes. The sound was almost identical to the tearing velcro noise he'd grown familiar with after multiple visits made by random fairy guards and caretakers, but it was sharper too. Firmer. No nonsense. Set in its ways. Content.

How Foop knew what post-it notes or velcro sounded like, or what they even were, well… he knew them the same way he understood how to speak with near-flawless grammar at his young age. He had been born of his parents' minds, with the best of the knowledge each one of them held; for his mother, this had been her ability to identify and recall objects, and his father, his linguistic awareness.

He listened as they came nearer, trying to appear as though he wasn't. Jorgen the fairy. Mystery figure. Jorgen the fairy. Mystery figure.

The mystery figure, when he finally came into view, was quite square in the face and deeply, deeply tan in the skin. Burned near red. Black hair. Gray suit. Sounded like cashmere when it rippled. At first glance, Foop thought his dark eyes were swollen like an insect's. It would be several minutes into the conversation before he determined with his poor vision that aforementioned "eyes" were actually glasses tinted dark. Someone, apparently, liked to keep the windows to their soul a secret.

"I will leave you to him," Jorgen announced, and withdrew up the hall. Out of sight, perhaps, but not out of range of Foop's sharp hearing, even if heavy doorway things clattered shut behind him. Waiting and listening. The little anti-fairy ground his fangs and set his back to them both.

"Hello, Anti-Poof Nebula Anti-Cosma-Anti-Fairywinkle."

Foop refused to grace the greeting with a response. He drew another circle on his latest paper, then slashed his claws through it until it tore to streamers.

The mystery figure tapped the glass pane - cruel, invisible, tangible glass pane - that separated them from one another. Dull thuds rang against the baby's eardrums and stapes. "My name is Mr. Caudwell Mayfleet. I work at Wish Fixers and I've been assigned to act as your therapist until further notice. I'm not a bragger, but they chose me because as far as pixies go, I'm the best at talking feelings."

"Don't fib to me," Foop sneered, still facing the other direction, but now plugging one of his tall ears. He pulled another paper across the rough stone floor towards him. "I'm no idiot. Your imprint in the energy field sounds too young to have gone through all those years of necessary school."

Enter one (1) clicking sound. Definitely a pen. Roller ball, .7 millimeters in diameter. The ink splashed like liquid thunder as this newcomer - Mr. Caudwell Mayfleet the pixie who worked at Wish Fixers - lowered the tip to the notebook in his lap. Plastic cover. Average quality. Perforated edges along the pages, by the skip in the faint rustle when deliberate fingers turned each of them one at a time and in near silence. Bound with a wire spiral. The glue crinkled in a way that suggested it had been applied a long time ago, as though perhaps the book had been stuffed away on a shelf or in a drawer for a long time until reluctant fingers had tugged it out. "That's not important," Caudwell said. "This was always my destiny and my internship began young. I learned from one of the best. Let's talk."

Foop remained silent, but his ears twitched. Mr. Caudwell Mayfleet the pixie had not brought a chair. Instead, he hovered almost a meter above the blue-gray stone. Higher than an Anti-Fairy speaking to him would have done, but still lower than your typical Fairy. His wings were quite strange. They didn't beat nearly as fast as a fairy's. Not at all. Instead, they sounded as though they churned in circles even more than Binky's did.

"Jorgen said you drank all your orange juice yesterday. That's very good. I must admit, it's long been fascinating to me to that Anti-Fairies don't need to drink milk after birth. The Seelie Court can't digest anything else until they're weaned around the time they shed their exoskeleton."

With one fist on his square jaw, Foop began to color the yellow crown of the fairy he was drawing.

"I brought you some more juice. I brought apple and grape too, just so you would have options. Would you prefer a red cup or a green cup?"

"Don't patronize me!" Foop grabbed the nearest alphabet block and launched it at Caudwell with all his young strength. Unfortunately, he'd forgotten again that just because he couldn't see the glass wall that caged him, it didn't mean it wasn't there, or that objects were able to pass through it the same way light waves and sound could. The block crashed and bounced away. Caudwell didn't even flinch, except with his pinky.

"Alright. The juice option is still on the counter if you change your mind."

"Well, listen to the nicey-nice little pixie with his quaint book of tattle-tale scribbles. Oh, come on! You aren't fooling anyone with that sappy 'Fool the pup into believing he has control of the situation' routine! That's the oldest trick there is on the headstone!"

Caudwell did not shrug, did not dip his head, did not write a note, did not show any sign of irritation at all. "Okay. No juice. Still, there is another fact about Anti-Fairies that I find interesting. I've always been told that your surnames come from your mothers."

"What do you think?" Foop actually didn't know if the answer to that question was a yes or a no, but he did understand enough to recognize that he didn't care.

"And yet, that leaves me wondering, how did you end up with the Anti-Fairywinkle name? Or the Anti-Cosma one, for that matter? They should have been lost long ago by drakian ancestors in the same way ours kept them. No Seelie Courter I've ever met can explain the intricate specifics of your system. How exactly does that work? Do you know, perchance?"

Foop felt his mind wandering as he groped for a third crayon, this one red. He'd switched the purple and yellow to his other hand, but had never let go of them. Wouldn't that be nice if he could slip away from this nightmare, just allow himself to fade while some other part of his mind remained active to answer Caudwell's pestering questions?

The pixie craned his neck, at the same time picking up the speed of his churning wings. "May I see what you're drawing?"

"I don't see why it's any business of yours. However, it wouldn't do for a masterpiece such as this one to go to waste untouched by admiring eyes." Foop picked up his picture with his claws and basked in it for a moment, then floated over to show it to Caudwell. He misjudged the distance and bumped his hands against the glass wall, but he concealed his mistake well enough, and held up the drawing so the pixie could see. It was a self-portrait. Er… that is to say, it was an image of his counterpart that he had whipped together from memory. He'd drawn a lot of them over the last two weeks, and he was getting fairly good.

"Hm. As I suspected. You're still in your period of egocentrism."

"Why, thank you. I am rather incredible, aren't I?"

Caudwell's thin, almost smug smile was very patient (Foop was very proud of himself for recognizing it, given that he had to squint hard to make it out, in addition to recognizing that facial expressions could be important in conversations). "That's a good guess, but the incorrect definition. I didn't mean 'egotistical', or even high in self-esteem, actually. I just meant that you're showing your picture to me backwards. The front is facing you, but you've pointed the blank side towards me. Despite your clearly advanced level of intellect, it would seem that your cognition has not yet fully developed; I can't see what you can."

Foop's round nose twitched. He looked again at his crude picture, with Poof's enormous purple eyes and thick lashes staring back at him. "What do you mean? It's right here. Are you stupid?"

"Why don't we pit you against a basic developmental test, just so you and I can gauge where you stand. Is that alright by you?"

"You're getting paid by the hour, aren't you?"

"Yes, but that doesn't concern you." To Foop's shock then, he poofed himself into the cell. Er… "ping"ed, maybe, if one were to guess from the high trilling noise that accompanied his scattered teleportation cloud. After Caudwell had swatted off a few of the clingier traces of vapor and dust, he crouched a bit and held out his upturned palm. A single black die with red spots rested in the center.

"Is this one of those trick games where I'm supposed to channel my inborn abilities as an Anti-Fairy to manipulate the number my roll lands on?"

"No. The fact that it's a die is inconsequential, really. I just want you to try picking it up."

Foop snorted and did so with ease. When Caudwell asked for it back, he chucked it over his shoulder and pretended it had slipped from his grasp.

"That's fine. I have more." The pixie drew another die from his pocket and held it out like the first. "Please pick this up and pass it from one hand to the other."

"… I'm going to have to ask for more specific instructions."

"Hold the die first in one hand, then switch it to the other."

"How do I do that?"

"That's what you'll demonstrate to me. Go ahead."

Foop brought the black and red cube close to his other palm, then tipped his hand to spill the die into it. It rebounded off his fingers and clattered across the hard stone floor. Flustered, he plucked it up and made another attempt. After that one too failed, he cleared his throat and glanced away. "It would appear you've brought me a loaded die. It doesn't work."

Caudwell tipped his head. "That's curious. You switched hands earlier, with the crayons."

"Did I? I don't remember doing that."

"Hmm… I'll have to look into this hidden response of yours. Can I ask you now to show me whether or not you perform the A-not-B search error?"

"I'm always up for showing off," he sniffed.

"In that case, slide me that jack-in-the-box near your foot, please." Once Foop had kicked it roughly in his direction, Caudwell took off his gray suit coat and lay it over the box. Then he spread out Foop's blanket (polyester, cotton, fleece) beside it and shifted away. "All right. Go find it."

"How dumb do you think I am?" Foop flipped up the jacket to reveal the blue and black jack-in-the-box, which he then picked up and hurled at the wall because he felt like it. Caudwell retrieved it and replaced it under his jacket once more.

"Okay. Now where is it?"

Same place. Foop scowled at the wall as the pixie placed the toy beneath his blanket.

"Again, if you would."

Foop's short attention span and slippery patience snapped in the same moment. He kicked off from the ground, latched onto Caudwell's collar, and twisted it hard. "Something is seriously wrong with you! I'm not a baby anymore. I am an intelligent being! You make a mockery of me with your silly parlor games!"

"Please retrieve the jack-in-the-box, Anti-Poof."

"Oh my smoke! It's right here, you insufferable paperweight!" So saying, Foop ripped Caudwell's jacket from the floor.

… to reveal that the stone floor was bare beneath it.

"What?" Both hands clapped to the sides of his square head. "What is this trickery? I don't understand. Where did it go? It was hidden right here last time."

"Maybe you could consider checking beneath your blanket."

"I fail to see how that's going to help me. That's ridiculous. I'm beginning to think that you're the one who should spend your days locked up in solitary confinement." The baby pointed at the ground. "Why are you not panicking? It's gone. And that was my favorite toy."

Caudwell leaned over and took Foop's dark blue blanket into his arms. When he did, the shiny plastic outsides of the jack-in-the-box glinted. It must have been teleported under there when he wasn't watching.

"Party magic tricks," Foop muttered.

"You're going thinningcore with stress," the pixie noted. "Let me try a few more things, very quick, and we're done."

"Fine, fine. Do what you will with me. At least it's a change of pace from sitting in here by myself." It could be a lonely existence at times, loathe as he was to admit it.

With a nod, Caudwell took Foop's body in his hands and lay him on his back. His leathery wings scrunched. Then the pixie knelt over him, lightly pinching the pup's sides with his knees. "W-what are you doing?" Foop stuttered, balling his small blue hands into fists.

"Testing your Babkin reflex," said the pixie, taking up those same hands by the wrists.

"Th-this is harassment! I have rights! I want out!"

"You can relax," he soothed as he uncurled Foop's fingers. "I'm a trained professional."

"Oh, because that's so reassuring in this type of context. Help! Jorgen, I'm being assaulted by a trained professional! Wailing sounds! Panicked crying! You're not helping!"

Caudwell pressed his thumbs into Foop's palms as the anti-fairy squirmed. After perhaps ten seconds, he appeared to be satisfied with whatever it was he was in search of, and perched back on his heels. Once the pressure on his chest was gone, Foop scrambled up and withdrew behind the nearest stack of alphabet blocks. Who could have guessed that the pixie had a hidden sadistic side?

"You're a sick, sick man," he hissed, "and for this, you will pay. I don't know who you really think you are, but you're not the type of person I can stand to be around."

"In that case, you can sit for this next bit. I have some flashcards I want to show you."

Foop ignored him for the first three minutes, but finally wandered over because it was something to do. Although, he regretted it soon enough. After what seemed to be only forty-five seconds of staring at cards, he zoned out for the rest of the session… something about schemas and colors and fruit. Something about, "Which jar has more water?" and "Which row has more coins?" When he finally blinked and looked around again, Foop realized that he was clutching a red sippy cup filled with apple juice. How did that happen?

He dropped it and glanced over to find that Caudwell had left the cell, and Jorgen was just returning. The pixie turned his back to Foop as the muscular fairy strode over, boots clomping. "Time is finished. Pixies, out. It is my turn now to communicate with the square bat child."

"Are my two hours up already, Jorgen? I hadn't noticed. Ahem. As far as his development goes, barring the absolute megalomaniac superiority complex, he appears to be functioning normally for an Anti-Fairy of his age. Then, a Fairy would have lost the Babinski reflex by this point, but he'll keep that all his life given that once he sheds his exoskeleton, it's wired in him to begin his life of hanging upside-down."

Foop narrowed his eyes. Jorgen was drinking up every word Caudwell spoke, and Caudwell of course wasn't looking at him.

He clenched his claws. It would be so easy.

Keeping his wings tucked against his back, he slid along the wall of his cell, creeping ever so softly, perfectly, as their exchange continued.

"Yes, and that's all right too. Make sure he gets plenty of folate. That's crucial for healthy Anti-Fairy development due to the fact that they technically subsist entirely off their own DNA. Orange juice, beets, and peanut butter are all good sources that a young pup should find attractive enough. I might also recommend snacks of grasshoppers and termites given that the anti-fairy patron is the Mexican free-tailed bat, and they're insectivorous."

"My father said we're fruit bats," Foop interrupted, still poised against the wall. Caudwell barely glanced at him.

"Then your father was wrong."

"Are you calling Drake High Count Julius Anti-Cosmo Anti-Lunifly-Anti-Cosma-Anti-Fairywinkle stupid now?" Foop didn't think much of his father – bit of a coward, that twitching old man – but he found himself offended nonetheless. After all, they were related by blood, and they both carried the same surname there at the end, so in a way, whatever people thought of his father, they thought of him too.

"No, not stupid. I'm only saying that that he lied to you because he's in denial. Has been hiding it forever."

"Denial?" he echoed, not entirely sure what the word meant. Caudwell must have interpreted his question as disbelief.

"Oh, come on. When was the last time anyone actually saw Anti-Cosmo eat a sprite?" Caudwell rolled his head as if his pupils were making the same motion beneath his tinted glasses, then faced Jorgen one more time. "Give it a month and his cognitive abilities should mature to the point where he'll be able to recognize himself in a mirror, and he should start using gestures such as shaking his head to mean 'No' and generally having more advanced fine motor skills around that time as well. We only need to be worried if he starts to lag behind the norm, which is a serious possibility given that he's back here essentially in solitary confinement. Between what I've observed today and what you told me before we started, I have my suspicions about his blanking-out periods, but only time will prove them right or wrong."

As the last word left his mouth, Foop pounced on his snooty therapist. Thunk!

"… And you may want to do something about that glass wall problem," Caudwell observed, peering down at Foop over the rims of his shades.

Jorgen just laughed. "I like to watch the Anti-Fairies do that. It brings them pain and reminds them they are puny."

Foop rolled from his rear over to his stomach and then to his feet, muttering incoherently to even himself as he stormed back to his crayons.

He'd half-hoped but half-doubted that that would be the end of it. Still, he had a plan prepared in the back of his mind for when Caudwell showed up, which happened to be the following morning. Another Friday, if he remembered correctly. All Anti-Fairies were born on Friday the 13th. He was June 13th, in the Spring of the Last Berry. One week before summer.

So after Caudwell floated in on June 27th, two weeks after his birth, Foop sat near the front of his cell calmly playing Turf War with a purple boat and a stuffed giraffe. "Hello, Mayfleet. Jorgen wanted me to let you know that your services will no longer be needed today, or ever, thank you, and to show yourself out. Good-bye."

"My paycheck says otherwise." The pixie, still on the far side of the glass, sat in a white plastic chair that Jorgen had dragged in for him early that morning. "I understand that you don't want to be here, but you don't have a choice. Not in the state you're in right now, anyway."

"Do whatever you want with me, flat-head. I can't be broken."

"But you can be rehabilitated, and that's why I'm here. Let's work together and get you out of this place, okay?"

Vaguely intrigued by the prospect of escaping Abracatraz but refusing to let it show, Foop tightened his grip on the boat. Caudwell rested his hand on a thin, pale yellow thing in his lap that didn't quite assimilate into any of Foop's pre-categorized schemas. "I was wondering if you would be willing to tell me about this obsession you have with your counterpart."

"Ha! You act as though that's a difficult request rather than a deep-seeded loathing I could blather on about until this rotting prison fell around me. Poof is a selfish, spoiled, crybaby of a brat who doesn't know how to take a hit, and he's round and ugly and I will bring him DEATH!"

"Why do you want to hurt him? Has he ever acted out against you?"

"He didn't have to. He sickens me. Everyone loves him, and he eats it up. There is no real reason for him to be so popular. I refuse to share my spotlight with someone of that sort. If there's going to be one Fairykind baby on television, I would much prefer it to be me. Foop!" He broke into maniacal laughter there at the end, and then gave himself hiccups and fell over.

Over the following week, Caudwell showed up each morning and would stay for hours, droning on about facts and reflexes and averages and Foop's inherited destiny as heir to the High Count seat, and asking question after question until he floated away again, with the anti-fairy jeering about his sunglasses or the circular motions of his square wings or his terrible taste in hats all the way down the hall.

Foop grew bored with him ("habituated" was the word the pixie used) and after awhile went back to coloring in the corner and choosing not to acknowledge his presence whatsoever. In fact, he was so good at ignoring Caudwell, that sometimes he forgot he was there at all. Some days Foop even forgot that he himself was there in that cell at all. His thoughts would wander, he'd drift off to sleep, in and out, in and out, sometimes more frequently throughout the morning, and other times for periods that seemed to last mere wingbeats.

"Foop," Caudwell said on Friday, "I want to tell you something that might be very important."

"You can talk all you like, you insignificant smudge. No one's stopping you."

Caudwell lowered his pen. "I'm technically not supposed to officially diagnose you until you're at least six months old, but it would seem to me that you show all the signs of having dissociative identity disorder."

"Do I?" Foop asked, mostly disinterested.

"That means it's highly likely you have a second personality. It's hidden, but definitely there."

He twirled one end of the long black fur beneath his nose. "And I care because?"

"It means you aren't always in control of yourself, at least not entirely. It's very interesting, though not particularly uncommon for an Anti-Fairy."

Foop's mind began to whirl. He grabbed at the concept and pulled. "Yes- Yes, that's precisely it! I'm not so bad! It's him! He whispers in my ear and tells me to do bad things- Yes, that is definitely what I go through every day, and if I don't do these bad things, he hurts me. It's him. You should let me go. I'm innocent! I was framed! Cry, cry, weeping sounds."

Caudwell chuckled with a dry, "Ha, ha". He said, "Your mother must have watched too many movies while she was forming your lifesmoke. That's not how this works. That's schizophrenia, but you aren't showing those symptoms. Dissociative identity disorder occurs when a very young mind has been placed under a great deal of stress, and the being in control of the mind - that's you - refuses to accept their stressful circumstances and wants to split away from reality and leave a replacement or 'imaginary friend' to cover for them."

Foop stared back at the pixie. His wings had lifted higher and higher as they listened, and the clawed tips were now scratching at his pointed ears.

"Sound familiar? You would have been very young. You're still in your critical/sensitive period now, actually, so… Technically, you're still susceptible to making more of them. It might go away, one day, or it won't. It depends."

"I…" He scratched his baby claws against the stone floor. "I imagine that perhaps I was… startled. It was a shock. That's how it started. Something. Falling. The sky. My head…" He shook himself and turned his back, and refused to speak again for the rest of the session. Caudwell made his return the following day, clutching the thin, pale thing that Foop now knew to be called a manila file folder.

"I did some additional research to refresh my knowledge on Anti-Fairies. I was right."

"Of course you were. When have you ever told me about any time you were wrong?"

Caudwell ignored the jibe and sat down in his usual plastic seat, which over the past several days had migrated into the cell rather than outside it. It snapped beneath his weight and dumped him to the floor. Foop cackled at that- it had taken so long to perfect the trap without it looking obvious. If Caudwell was annoyed, he gave no sign. Instead, he tucked his short legs beneath him and cleared his throat.

"Falling to the ground from any decent height would kill the pup of an actual Earth bat."

"How fortunate for me then that I'm immortal."

"Conditionally immortal, yes." Keeping one ear plugged, the pixie opened the folder and very delicately, like it were injured and beautiful, drew out a sheet of paper. "I've been informed that you've both fallen and hit your head in the past. Possibly multiple times. Additionally, that slight limp in your right wing that stems from your father's mindset has given you some difficulty flying, and as a result you have a habit of bashing into things."

"Your point being?" Foop asked, not taking the paper. Caudwell replaced it gingerly where he'd drawn it out.

"While a fall won't kill you, you can severely damage yourself if this goes on."

"I'm an Anti-Fairy. We're born damaged, with limited control over our poor, messed-up little lives thanks to your kind." He squeezed his rubber elephant. "Seelie Courters- they'll be the death of us all; you note my words in blood."

Caudwell watched him. "I also learned something else."

"Oh, splendid. Congratulations. Extra credit. You've just been promoted to work with endangered sea otters. Have a cupcake. Down a soda." Foop flung the toy elephant and his hands into the air. "Does it sound like I even remotely care what you do in your off time?"

"All babies need physical touch, but Anti-Fairies especially. You have bat DNA coursing through a third of your genetic code. If you don't get enough physical touch, it will stunt your growth."

"I can live with that."

"And it will negatively impact your intelligence."

"Hmm." Foop picked up a colorful alphabet block and set it on top of another. "No, I rather think I'll be all right."

Caudwell leaned forward. "I want to help you."

"You want to manipulate me," Foop corrected.

"No. I'm not doing this for me. I really do want to help."

The anti-fairy snorted softly and made a few exaggerated gestures with his hands and eyes. "How much are they paying you, again? And who's shelling out for this anyway? Jorgen? My parents? Taxes?"

"If you really want to know, Pixies Inc. is funding this as a favor to your uncle Anti-Robin, who alerted us to your conditions here."

"Uncle Anti-Schnozmo?" Foop had met the long-nosed anti-fairy for the first time just over a week ago, so half a lifetime ago. He'd been named after Foop's own grandfather, or something.

Caudwell shrugged. "I suppose."

"Why should you want to do him a favor?"

The pixie's upper lip twitched. "We're getting off the subject at hand."

Sigh; nostril sigh. "Oh, alright. What do you propose I do to maintain or improve my advanced level of intellect?"

"You and I are going to cuddle."

"Is he kidding?" Foop crossed his arms. "The Harbinger of the Doom Time does not do cuddles. I'm entirely independent and completely well-functioning."

With a tap of a button on Caudwell's cell phone, every inanimate toy and blanket and loose chip of stone rotated in Foop's direction, and swarmed. He yelped. He swatted. He kicked. He tore with his fangs. But despite his best struggles, the toys dumped him in Caudwell's lap. Before he could scramble up again, the pixie wrapped his arms around his square body and leaned back against the wall.

"Unhand me! I'm the heir to the High Count seat! I'll one day declare war on your people for this! You've doomed your civilization in an instant! I would be your ruler!"

Instead of acknowledging his protests, Caudwell kept in the corner and began scratching his fingers against various points on the young anti-fairy's head. Foop gnawed on his wrist, blurting out the meanest bad words he knew (He knew an awful lot of them, like "doody" and "stinkhead"), and then-

then-

He blinked. He still had half his claws in the sleeve of Caudwell's gray jacket. And he was still fully himself- no doubt about that. But…

"Oh," he sighed. His fingers relaxed. "Yes. Rub my upper corner again, cuddle slave."

Caudwell ran his palm back and forth over the pointy corner. Foop tried to keep his body tense, but his limbs began to collapse one by one. He leaned his head against the pixie's chest and slipped his thumb in his mouth. A trill tickled upwards from deep within his throat. His eyelids drifted shut.

"You like this?"

"Yes. It's soft."

"This type of thing is healthy for your development."

"Mmhm." Foop found that he didn't really care. The slow, regular strokes of the pixie's hand pleased him, and as far as he was concerned, hey… He could surely suffer through a few minutes of clinging, smothering snuggles if it meant sparing his intelligence, couldn't he? As far as hidden weaknesses went, was his really so bad?