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You're getting the story, because I want to see how Derik will tell it. He's a Harper at heart, and inclined to ramble in his current state, so it's gonna take time. But don't worry, I'm not quitting. {= )

~Neshomeh

"Oh, does you want an appy polly loggy that my slovos are too bolshy and messel like for some zallky ded with a malenky mozg to pony? Best not boohoo, 'cause your lovely Ingles ain't so special like, and I'll govoreet as I'll please, viddy that? Oh, and put to the record: lewdies is just all the chellovecks, right? So you're a chelloveck, I'm a chelloveck, and we're here all chellovecks, but we're all all of us here the lewdies, okay?" He fluttered his eyelashes.

"Jeeze, you're such a jerk," Anne muttered to him. "Harry speaks some weird Russian English thing from his home world. We mostly get what he means from context and tone, but half of what he says isn't worth hearing anyway. Don't think about it too much, and don't be insulted. It's just a teen rebellion thing." Quietly, she added, "Even though he's only nine."

Harry flipped her off with one hand.

"yes, I'm so impressed with how adult and mature you are."

Harry flipped her off with both hands.

Numbuh 3721, meanwhile, nodded to Peregrin. "Indeed, we were making for the candy table. A heavy dose of candy consumption at one sitting will be the first step in your Halloween education."

Alex made a face. "Stinks up my RC to high heaven. It's awful. I give him bits of my own food as a treat, sometimes." He tickled Zeke's eyebrow ridges, and the blue crooned. "They nest near the beach in their home continuum, so lots of fish. I can't stand the stuff, personally."

He peered at Zeke enthusiastically. "I don't think I've ever seen a dragon or a fire-lizard before..." He turned to Alex. "What do you feed him?"

Thoth kept his hand on Derik. "Perhaps you should sit. You seem to slightly unstable. If you wish, you may tell me your tale."

The little blue puffed his chest out proudly.

"You alright?" Alex asked Derik anxiously. "I, um. I can leave, if you'd feel more comfortable." He whistled, and Zeke took off to land on his shoulder once more.

At Alex's touch, Derik jerked and likely would have lashed out at the boy whose every aspect seemed calculated to mock him, but then Thoth was at his back, deep voice rumbling in his ears and his bones. He went still.

Gall took the opportunity to wrench his hand away and step back, glaring. "Do that to me again and I will kick your Spandexed butt, got it?"

Derik shuddered, his muscles shedding their combative tension, and straightened up—well, more or less. He reeled backward, and was rather grateful for support at that moment. "I—I apologize, everyone. I shouldn't—it's not his fault." He gestured vaguely at Alex. "It's not your fault." And at Gall. "Most of all, not the little cousin's fault. I'm sorry." He hid his face behind one hand.

Surprised and relieved not to be the one controlling the situation for a change, Jenni had done her best to keep Zeke calm throughout. Now she felt up for responding to Tom's interest. "He's a Pernese fire-lizard," she explained. "Genetic forebears of the dragons. Zeke's two, so he's fully mature, or just about."

(( Space Marines do have really deep voices, right? ))

He placed his hand upon Derik's back. "I would not suggest this course of action. And I think you would regret it."

Meanwhile, Tom walked over to the dragon. "Hi, Zeke!" he said. He gently stroked the beast. "Aww... He's adorable!"

"Since fire's involved," Charlotte said, shrugging. "How're you doing, Ix? Enjoying the party so far?"

"Feeling a little overwhelmed, actually," Ix said faintly. "You guys don't mind if I excuse myself for a bit?" she asked, looking anxiously at Matt and Izzy.

Alex stepped forward, putting a hesitant hand on Derik's shoulder. "I mean, he was the runt of his litter. Hatching? Thing?" He swallowed; though he was tall, both Derik and Gall were obviously stronger than he was, and he didn't want to get between them if they started trading blows.

((You're fine! Zeke's a pretty playful and friendly little guy. He'll give anyone the time of day if they give him scritchies.))

"But that's a long story. Luna herself was really offended the first time she saw a Nightmare Night party; it didn't help that every time she tried to fit in she just scared the townsponies even more. But she's come around to the idea now. Also, what are 'lewdies'?"

"Yeah, you've been using a lot of weird words this whole time, Joker Jr.," Chris cut in. "What's the deal?"

Ami dropped her Epona illusion long enough to give Chris a firm magical dope-slap.

"Ow! Let me rephrase that so Ami doesn't smack me again; what flavor of English do you speak?"

Jenni smiled widely despite herself and held out her forearm so the little blue could perch. "Not eating too much junk tonight, I hope?" She rubbed his eye-ridges with one finger and let him feel her affection.

Following the fire-lizard's gaze, her heart sank. "Leave him be, little one," she murmured, and turned to put her body in their line of sight.

"It's fine," Derik growled, turning away himself and handing the half-full plate of snacks off to Gall. "'S time I left anyway—it's a party, after all. I've dragged it down long enough." He pushed himself up with one hand on the back of the chair, and it was a good thing, too, because he swayed on his feet and nearly collapsed as it was.

Gall snorted. "Nice try, buddy. Sit back down! Don't let an ugly, soft little runt like him—eep!"

Derik jerked her forward with his fingers down the neck of her breastplate. The snacks went flying.

The ex-rider snarled in her face, "Do not. Insult. Dragonkin. In front. Of. Me."

(( Aaand there's the dark side that's always lurking! Don't worry, I'm not gonna let any actual violence happen in this RP. If Derik's new bro wanted to intervene, though, he'd probably appreciate it later. (Or, when my turn comes around again, Gall will backpedal herself out of trouble, or Jenni will jump in. Or whatever!)

(( Oh, and Ix, let me know if I went too far with Zeke; I can always redo it. ))

"Thriller, thriller night! So let me hold you tight and share a killer, thriller, yow~!" Miguel sang along, doing his best to moonwalk. "I'm gonna thrill you tonight~"

Violet, wearing Wonder Woman's iconic leotard-boots-bracelets-tiara ensemble and a black wig, stopped doing the memetic zombie dance and cleared her throat. "Darkness falls across the land, the midnight hour is close at hand. Creatures crawl in search of blood to terrorize your neighborhood..."

"It's 'y'all's neighborhood,' get it right." Miguel gave her an annoyed look.

"And whosoever shall be found without the soul for getting down/Must stand and face the hounds of hell and rot inside a corpse shell," she continued. "Yeesh, I feel like I'm summoning Hades. No wonder he got Vincent Price to do this part."

"This is one of many reasons why I love Halloween," said Miguel with a grin. "When else do you get to see Wonder Woman doing the Thriller dance?"

"I would assume the outtakes of her latest film, Mr. Bond." Violet returned his grin. "Oooh, here comes the cool part of the monologue! And though you fight to stay alive, your body starts to shiver..."

"For no mere mortal can resist..."

"The evil...of the Thriller!" they intoned. They then high-fived as Vincent Price's evil laugh echoed from the speakers.

"They almost put me in DoSAT! Then they decided not to. Something about 'danger to fellow agents,' or whatever." He shrugged.

Thoth, meanwhile, was staring intently at Alex, trying to discern why he had such an affect on Derik.

"Yeah, sure. I get it. Obviously... the cons outweight the pros," she said, although there was a little hint of disappointment in her voice.

"So, what did we miss?" Matt asked, looking at his partner, who quickly grinned at him.

"We've decided we don't want to explode dear ol' Charlotte."

Dax rolled her eyes. "Nah, I'd rather just stay here if it's all the same to you. Say, have you got any other Halloween traditions or anything? Where I came from, there was a harvest festival every year, but from what I understand that's closer to, uh... Thanksgiving, I think it was called?"

Zeke lifted off his shoulder and flew over to Jenni, chirping happily.

Alex turned to Tom. "Alex Dives, DoSAT," he said, and jerked a thumb at the fire-lizard. "And the little guy is Zeke. He's generally pretty friendly, but he'll bite your fingers if they smell good."

Zeke turned his head to Derik, eyes whirling with shades of green and blue.

"Okay, good," she said. "There might have been something I could do, but the red tape alone would've been a challenge."

When Alex arrived, Derik took one look at him and froze in place like a hunted animal. His mood had been lightened somewhat by the cleansing act of commiserating with a brother-in-spirit, but it abruptly blackened. He said nothing.

"Alex," Jenni greeted him. "They started it, not me."

"And I saw enough of trick-or-treating when i was a kid to be happy with it. Try it as much as you want, I'm fine being here, I won't get bored."

"Not even for showing two poors rookies the ropes of Halloween?" Richard said.

"Knock a door. Say 'Trick or treat' to the person opening. Collect candies. Avoid too much tricking in this place. Enjoy yourselves. If you fail that, you weren't ready for that dangerous mission anyways, and no mentor will help you."

He tried a piece of the fried drink. Then he grabbed his Coke, and began gulping furiously. "That... that was worse than I expected."

Thoth turned to Jenni. "No, I am not. For those of us who survived the ritual, it did, in fact, serve its purpose. I am stable."

"And a great relief it is to the rest of us, too," said Tom, finally recovered. He turned to the newcomer. "Ah! 'Allo! Who're you?"

A blond boy dressed as a dragon rider, accompanied by a blue fire-lizard perched on his shoulder, approached, munching on one of the same green fritters. "This is supposed to be a party, not a therapy session." Alex shoved the rest of the pastry in his mouth, cheeks bulging, and he held up his fingers for Zeke to lick.

Dax looped her arm through Marina's. "We're not gonna leave you out! That'd just be rude! If you don't want to do the tricksy stuff, got any other ideas in mind?"

Gall broke hers open and made a revolted face at the gooey, neon green innards. "Ugh, it looks like Fellrazer's poop."

Her being her, she didn't hesitate to put it in her mouth anyway. Derik was right behind her, and they reacted with near-identical sour faces.

"It's so sweet... gack." Derik coughed on the acidic lime fumes in his throat. "Why?"

Gall laughed. "Oh, gods, what is this even supposed to be? It's so gross! Forget what I said earlier; you have to try this." She thrust a greenish fritter at Tom.

Despite being momentarily distracted by the others' antics, Jenni had kept most of her attention on Thoth, and now she spoke up. "Do you still worry about... the flesh-change?" It was a term she was uncomfortable having on her tongue, evoking nightmarish Akira-esque images even without context. She knew the power of names, and agreed that this was one best invoked as little as possible. Yet she had to ask. "Are you afraid that could still happen to you?" This was a two-pronged concern: one for the man himself, one for everyone around him.

"Thank you," he said.

Tom turned to look at Gall, his face displaying a horrified expression. "They fried Ecto Cooler? Good god, that's horrifying. What will they do next? Dip Doritos in Mountain Dew?"