[Halloween 2019] Full House

It was a nice house. It really was. It was big, but not too spacious. Each room had its defining feature, such as a stove for the kitchen, a fire place for the living room, and doors into everyone's rooms. The wooden flooring didn't have some annoying creak, the walls looked sturdy and none of the windows were shattered or broken. It was a nice pleasant little house in the suburbs of Grassveil, if you could call it a suburb given that Grassveil was a small yet busy town.

She woke up in the mornings on a comfortable bed, had access to food to make breakfast, lunch, and dinner with, and had all the time in the world to spend with...kids who weren't really all that interested in sticking around it seemed. Chance liked to wander off, resulting her needing to chase him down if he didn't come back at a certain time, and Emmelyn either was dragged off with him or at the library.

Which meant Mirage was left home. Alone. To do...well, that question bothered her every day for the past two weeks. At first she waited for Sova. After she told him about the kids, she kind of expected him to show up. As each day passed, however, she began to lose hope. Instead, it began to anger her. It started to feel like she was more of some pet waiting for their master to come home. After the first week, she decided that perhaps it wouldn't hurt to wander Grassveil a little. She kept up disguises, of course, but every time she went out she worried about Sova coming back to find nobody home. She couldn't bring herself to have the courage to speak to any pokemon either.

What was the point of it? She was just going to be someone else tomorrow. There would be trouble if she tried to establish an identity. She'd have to upkeep it, maintain it, and if the disguise ever broke, she's done for, Sova's done for, and even the kids. She had no choice but to resign herself to the house and...do nothing. What could she even do? She was a wanted outlaw who didn't do outlaw-y things anymore. She was a fugitive who had no choice but to stay in the same bland empty looking house she didn't really know how to go about decorating.

In a way, it felt almost like a prison to her. A prison that held the door open, but every time she left it was a roll of the dice whether she'd be thrown into an even worse one. It was demeaning.

At the very least, each day brightened up a little when the kids came home. Emmelyn would have something new she learned while Chance would have some wild tale of adventure to tell everyone. It was nice to hear from them, but whenever they asked her about the world and what to do...she was lost. She gave the best answer she could, but she knew it wasn't enough. She didn't know anything about the world. Everything she did know was a lie, that was made very apparent to her.

Now, she was stuck with two kids at dinner on a Friday night pretending everything was absolutely okay.

Was this the place? Sova had spent the past hour or so wandering around Grassveil, in the dark, struggling to remember where the place he had bought for Mirage was. Considering it was technically "his" house, it was sad that he could not remember its location. He had gotten it wrong and knocked on the wrong door a few times too, and after all the fuss that zangoose had given when he'd mistaken her house for the right one... yeah, he wasn't going to do that again. He felt like bringing out the claws was a little uncalled for, but then again he did just kind of waltz into her house and proclaim that he was home, so maybe getting scratched in the face was fair. Zangoose had very sharp claws, as it turned out.

This was only the latest in the long chain of bad decisions and worse luck that was Sova's life.  Just in the past few weeks, he had nearly died fighting a god, gone through a complete mental breakdown simultaneously, and probably traumatized everyone who had tried to help him afterward. Then, when told he now had children, his first response was to take a mission for "as far away as possible" and run off the second he could walk, then almost die. Again. He had at least made sure Mirage was taken care of before walking off and not coming back, but he doubted that made up for just leaving without even saying anything.

So, of course, he wasn't eager to face Mirage and had taken his time in coming back. After the mission, he took a detour down to Rainfront for... therapy? Okay, so he went to some popular inn and tried a few drinks that were supposedly very good... and then a few more... then he learned he liked something called "Blue Tiger's Blood." And so, here he was now, stumbling through Grassveil and drinking this blue concoction from a flask he had purchased specifically for this purpose. Now, he was ready to see Mirage.

"Um... are you okay? Mister?"

The quiet voice coming from inside his bag snapped him out of a deep state of thought long enough to remember that he was standing in front of Mirage's house. Probably. He looked down into the bag with a dull, absent gaze.

Oh. Right. And he had also sort of adopted a child. This would go over well.

"O'right... Veal... I f'rgot y- hic... were there..." he muttered semi-coherently with an unsteadily wobble.

"Zeal..." the small eevee in his bag corrected him.

"O-kay!" Sova exclaimed affirmatively as he raised his head and took a step toward the door.

He then prompetly fell against the door, collapsing in a heap with the cloth of his white cloak draped over him. Well, technically that was a knock. If anyone was home, they had probably heard it. Now he just had to lay here at their doorstep and wait for someone to come out and smack him and call him a pervert and a burglar like last time.

A sound from the door. She could hardly hear it over Chance's blathering, but it was there. The duo were instructed to remain at the table as she stepped out of the kitchen. The red haze coated her briefly before her form shifted. From zoroark to weavile, she approached the door with caution and silence. A claw reached for the knob and gave it a turn. She opened the door a crack and peeked through it. The smell hit her. Was...was that Blue Tiger's Blood? She looked down. The tell-tale white cloak was mushed against the door. She...didn't know what to feel.

She swung the door open, allowing the glaceon to flop onto the floorboards if he didn't catch himself. A weavile stared down at the form of the ice type. Slowly and steadily, anger began to build. Not just anger, but something else too. She stepped outside, a claw hooked onto the cloak to drag him out with her. The door closed quietly behind her. A closer look at the glaceon forced her to notice something...new. There was a brown little cancer tumor on his side-wait that's an eevee.

...

She took in a deep breath as she tried her best to keep her voice low and quiet. "You better have a damn good reason for all of this." She succeeded, however, her voice carried just the right amount of venom to make how she felt crystal clear.

Sova raised his head weakly as someone opened the door and began dragging him away from the house. For a moment, he assumed he was wrong yet again and was about to be assaulted by yet another pokémon with large claws, considering it seemed to be a weavile... and then she spoke. Oh dear, yes, this was definitely Mirage. She sounded very upset and wanted an explanation, but for what? Disappearing for weeks without a word? Showing up barely able to stand? Or maybe she had noticed the child in his bag? He didn't have a good explanation for any of this, unfortunately.

The glaceon took a moment to carefully consider his words and collect himself before responding. "I was very sad," he said, trying his best not to slur his words, "Hey by th'way this'z- hic... Veal." His attempt to hold his composure didn't last long. He looked up at Mirage with a tired and confused look, clearly revealing the claw marks across his face... and then went limp. Not passed out, just... laying there.

The eevee, sensing the hostility in the weavile's voice, retreated into the depths of the bag to hide. "Zeal... m-ma'am..." came his quiet voice once he had sufficiently hidden himself.

He...was very sad. He was sad? Although Mirage's fur bristled, the weavile's face remained unchanging. He got to go off and do whatever he wanted while she was stuck here, alone and confused for TWO. WEEKS. The anger boiled inside her. She really wanted to let him know just how sad she was. She took in a deep breath, ready to just let it all out, but she stopped.

The way he looked at her was pitiful. The fresh scratch across his face only seemed to accentuate it. She held her breath for a moment as she further debated whether or not she wanted to do this here and now...in front of "Zeal" or whoever this eevee was. She folded her arms, both literally and on the illusion, before she'd give a slow exhale in attempt to repress the growing frustration and anger.

"Okay...and why exactly is Zeal here?" while the hostility was toned down, it was difficult to completely hide the feelings she tried so hard to simply repress for the moment.

For a moment, the only sign of life from Sova was his slow, rythmic breathing as he listened to Mirage and contemplated his response. Most of this time was spent simply trying to focus enough to form a coherent thought, but this proved difficult... until he turned his head toward his bag and peered inside at the fearful eevee. Seeing that face was reminder enough of why Zeal was here. "Took a mission out by Grima..." he began before pausing to lift his head again, now with a more solemn look on his face. He briefly considered taking another drink from his flask, which was how he had been handling these emotions for the past few days or so, but... Mirage at least deserved a proper explanation first.

"Saved 'im from some guy... long story. Turns out 'iz dad got hit with the badtouch, I di'n wanna leave the kid alone, so here we are," he explained, unable to hold eye contact with Mirage out of a feeling of guilt. Not only was he guilty over essentially adopting this child without even saying anything to Mirage, but just talking about the situation reminded him that there were some things he just couldn't fix.

Zeal, meanwhile, had no interest in contributing to the conversation. He instead chose to stay hidden in the bag, shrinking as far into it as he could.

. . .

The bad touch, huh? Mirage's eyes focused on the kid in the bag, almost as if sizing the little guy up. She sat in silence as she continued to think over just what to do and make of this situation. Her first question was whether or not Sova was out of his god damn MIND!? From the looks of it and the smell of the Steamrise classic, yes, yes he was. The zoroark wanted to raise her voice, growl, and express her dissatisfaction so much...but this was neither the time nor the place.

"Stay." Her voice ordered the glaceon, as if he had much of a choice. She turned around and stepped back into the house. Her voice could be heard inside, instructing Chance and Emmelyn to head to bed early.

Chance's voice could be heard questioning her, but his voice silenced itself quickly into a meek "Okay" that was barely audible even with the sensitive ears of eeveelutions. Once the children were sufficiently sent to their bedrooms to finish their dinner and sleep, she returned to the front door and opened it once more. She slipped a claw around the strap of the bag and slowly pulled it from the glaceon, so that he had time to move to make it easier if he felt like being helpful. The bag was lifted off from the ground with eevee in tow.

The glaceon was invited inside...only to trip halfway through the doorway. One claw held up the bag, while the other now caught the drunk before he fell face-first into the floorboards. Annoyed and thoroughly unamused, she dragged the glaceon further inside until the door at least wouldn't hit him as it closed. She settled him back down on the ground and did so. As soon as she heard the soft click of the front door, the illusion vanished with only minor puffs of dark smoke that dissipated in seconds.

"They're in their room. You can talk to them when you're sober...can you clean up your own face or am I going to have to drown you for a little bit?" she asked, still keeping a hold on the bag-o-eevee.

----

Chance. Was. Upset. Why did he and Emmelyn have to go to bed so early!? It was nowhere NEAR bed time! At least, the way he interpreted bed time. For him it was more of a suggestion. The little zorua paced back and forth near the door with tail swishing to and fro. Every now and then he'd put his ear up to the door only to give a frustrated growl and push himself away again.

"Somethin' fishy's goin on..." he informed his sister. He paused for a moment before his eyes trailed over to the window in the room. A wicked smile stretched from ear to ear before he looked to his sister, "Eeeeeeeemmmmmm, we gotta go spy!"

When told to stay, Sova stayed... primarily because the other option was to move and that required moving. The longer he stayed on the ground, the more comfortable he became with it, nearly lulling himself into sleep within the short time Mirage stepped away from him. He was only snapped back to reality by a tugging feeling around his neck, which prompted him to lift his head again so that the disguised zoroark could take his bag away. Even in his disoriented state, he was clearheaded enough to understand that Zeal was probably better in her hands at the moment.

Unfortunately, he ended up having to stand, which he did without complaint. He certainly didn't want Mirage to have to literally drag him into the house, but perhaps that would have been for the best. Instead, he tried to walk on his own and immediately tripped through the doorway, only being spared a hard fall by Mirage's quick reflexes. He let out an idle groan of general displeasure as he was lowered onto the floor, but made no comment on the situation. By now he was beginning to realize just how bad he looked, and it made him want to do anything but acknowledge the state he was in.

Being left on the floor, he found sleep beckoning him once more, but Mirage's voice kept him anchored to reality. Something about talking to a vague "they" which he could only assume were his supposed children, and an apparent complaint about his face being dirty, the latter of which he didn't understand... until he remembered the zangoose he had been clawed by. "Is it that bad?" he mumbed as he stood uneasily, looking to Mirage to see that she had now dropped her guise.

He wasn't fully aware, but yes, it was that bad. Not only did he have relatively fresh scratch marks across his face, but his body also bore a variety of scars and more recent injuries. Fortunately, he was mostly covered by his cloak, but even that couldn't completely hide how tattered he looked.


Emmelyn, unlike her delinquent brother, wanted nothing more than to do what she was told and avoid trouble with Mom. She liked not getting into trouble, but Chance seemed to disagree with this philosophy on a fundamental level, always looking for new ways to actively provoke not only Mom but everyone else he came across as well. It was understandable for him to be curious about what was going on that required them to go to bed early; sure, Emmy was curious too, but that didn't mean she was contemplating spying and getting in trouble... Well, not until her devious brother started putting the idea in her head, anyway.

"Chance, you're gonna get us both in trouble..." she responded with a fearful frown, knowing already how little her words would do to sway him. She didn't even want to put any serious effort into trying to fight his will, partly because she knew how pointless it would be, but also because... well, she did want to know what was going on. If they got caught, well, it wasn't like it was her idea...

But no, that was bad and she didn't want to be bad. The silvery eevee just wanted to eat her dinner and go to bed and not have to feel guilty about following Chance in one of his little schemes.

He managed to stand and speak some more. The slur wasn't that bad, which she appreciated. It probably took all of his brain power to maintain at that moment. "It'll help keep it from getting infected, so go do it." There was a small part of her that was happy that he showed up at all, but circumstances did more than enough to bury that feeling at that moment. She really wasn't ready for talking to Sova at that moment, not when he was a drunk mess. She got the feeling that he wasn't up for talking much either...otherwise he would have showed up sober and sooner.

Attention back to the bag, she brought it closer to her. Each paw opened up each side of the bag to allow her to peer inside at the small child Sova brought home. She needed to...address this...in some way. "So...Zeal..." she started, "Do you...wanna get out of the bag?" Nope. "...Hungry?" Nooope...a little. Okay, that was something.

"Alright..." Mirage looked over to the leftovers of dinner. There wasn't much left. It wasn't the best, but it was something. The zoroark assumed that Sova went off to do as he was told, thoroughly deciding that the frightened Eevee-child was now the priority. The eevee-in-a-bag was placed at the end of a table on top of a cushion. It was technically Chance's spot, but Chance wasn't using it right now so she didn't really care. The table was still a mess, but she managed to scrounge together some leftover snack that she placed on the table in front of the eevee. If Zeal wanted to, he could leave the bag, grab it, and easily go right back in. If Sova cared about crumbs in his bag, then maybe he should have thought twice about how he approached all of this.

----

Despite her protest, he was already on the job. The window was easy to open. A quick flick of a lock followed by a gentle push opened the window right up. It was honestly concerning how easy he found it to get it open. He looked over to Emmelyn with a paw over his mouth, suggesting that she remain quiet. He gestured towards the window before he gave a nod of his head for her to follow along. He jumped down from the spot into the soft grassy terrain below. He didn't even wait to see if his sister followed along, eager to get around the house in the cover of night to get a better look and ear of what happened in the living room and kitchen.

With a groan in protest, Sova walked off and began wandering the house in search of purification. As he did, he also took in the appearance of the building. It was nice, just as he had hoped, but it seemed a bit... empty. It felt almost as if Mirage didn't consider it to be her own house; it certainly didn't feel very homey, with all the bare space. Did she just not want to decorate, or was there something she didn't like about the house? He would need to ask later, when he was done with...

Suddenly, mid-thought, he collapsed again. His mind was going dark. What was he even supposed to be doing? He had forgotten, and now that he was laying down once more, it was all he wanted to do.

The eevee he had brought with him, meanwhile, was doing considerably better. When asked if he wanted to get out of the bag, his response was a sheepish "No," and when asked if he was hungry, "No" again. After a moment's deliberation, however, he changed his mind. "A little..." he admitted quiety, shrinking as far down into the bag as he could go. He remained in the bag even once it was placed down, leaving its comfort briefly only to grab a berry before retreating once more. "Thank you, miss..." he spoke quietly and began to nibble on the berry.


Of course. As expected, Chance's determination to defy all reasonable expectations of him was all-encompassing, and he was already opening the window before Emmelyn could even say anything more. He shushed her and gestured for her to follow him out the window, but she didn't want to. "No-" she began in a hushed tone just as the zorua climbed out the window and left her. "Chance!" she whispered in a harsher tone, taking a step after him before hesitating.

It would be wrong to follow him, she told herself. It would be bad. Mom would be angry. She was better off just staying here and letting him get himself in trouble without her. But, no matter what she told herself, she only felt more antsy and eager to follow him with every passing second. She fidgeted her front paws anxiously as she tried to ignore the impulse to chase after Chance, but it wasn't long at all before she was climbing through the window too. "Wait for me!" she spoke quietly as she pursued the zorua.

Should...she tell the kid her name-name? She wasn't sure. Sova said he didn't want to leave the kid alone and implied that nobody was around to take care of them. The dad was mentally gone, but what about the mother? Was he just going to take the kid to an orphanage or something and the kid was going to spend the night here? She decided against telling the kid any name for now. "Miss" worked just fine for her.

It was a head-scratcher to her as to what she should be doing right just then. Make the kid comfortable? They didn't exactly have any spare beds and she'd rather not get Chance and Emmelyn worked up over a new face so late into the night...especially when the kid seemed terrified enough already. Chance would probably traumatize him further.

She heard a thump in the hall. Her ears twitched as the immediate assumption was that Sova passed out from alcohol. What was she even supposed to do with this entire situation??? She thought about it for only a few seconds, before she came to a conclusion. "I'm going to go move the icicle to his room so he can melt properly or something," she announced to the child, "Do you want to go with me or do you want to wait here?"

----

If Chance heard his sister, it seemed like he ignored it. The zorua was fast on his feet with his sister on his heels. He was quick to zip around to the side of the house, slip under a hole in the fence, and make it to the front of the house. He flattened his ears as his mind entered some sort of "stealth" mode as the operation was well under way. His footsteps were silent as he approached a window into the kitchen.

He ran a paw over the tuft of fur on his head to flatten it, so that it wouldn't stick out as much, before he peeped up over the windowsill and into the room. Immediately, he was taken aback. There was someone in his seat! The zorua's jaw dropped as the most criminal offense he could imagine was enacted against him.

"There's someone in my seat!" he whispered to Emmelyn, far more concerned that the new kid was in his seat than he was with the existence of a different child in the house to begin with.

Sova was a failure. He felt like a failure. And a disappointment. And tired. And drunk. He wanted to just go to sleep on the floor in his filth and misery. Every movement he made with this damned ribbon around his neck was agonizing, he apparently looked so bad that Mirage didn't even want him around her kids, and it seemed he had somehow managed to make all the wrong decisions today on top of everything else already wrong with his life. And what did he really have to do here that was so hard he just couldn't do it? Make himself decent for one night? Be presentable? Act remotely sane?

He just wanted to do this right, but it was entirely his fault that he had done it so wrong. He had actively, knowingly chosen to do everything wrong because he was too weak and too scared. He couldn't even find the will to make himself get back up, no matter how much he wanted to or how hard he tried. Passing out on the floor seemed like pretty much the only way the he could possibly prove himself any worse at this point, so maybe it was appropriate. Maybe he deserved it. His eyes fell shut as he lost the battle to stay awake and accepted his final failure of the night.

...And then her eyes blinked open.


"O-oh... um..." Zeal muttered hesitantly in response to the zoroark, clearly not eager to leave the safety of the bag. "I'm okay... I can wait here," he stated nervously, then continued nibbling the food he had been given.


Emmelyn did her best to keep up with her brother, but as he stopped and crawled under the fence, she struggled to do the same. She instead slipped and fell, tumbling to a stop with a light "Ow..." before getting back up and rushing after Chance. She reached him just in time to hear him say something about someone in his seat. Without asking, the eevee hopped up onto her brother's back and peered over his head so that she could also see into the window, and sure enough... there was someone in there. In... a bag?

"That's what you're worried about?" she muttered backas she stared into the window. There seemed to be a lot of other much more pressing questions here. "Who is it? Why are they here?" she continued without waiting for a response, seeing her previous question as rhetorical because yes, Chance's seat was obviously his primary concern.

The kid was fine with it...and apparently really liked the bag. Okay then. She decided to leave him to it. She stepped into the hall to find her collapsed...boyfriend? It was still weird to think about for her. Not uncomfortable, just...weird. Mirage had to hold back a sign upon seeing him, seeing as the children's rooms weren't too far off. One wrong sound and they'd probably be set off like a pack of dogs laying sight on a mailman.

"Alright, come on," she spoke as she moved to pick him up. Instead of the ol' grab and drag by the cloak, she decided to legitimately pick him up this time-if she was allowed.

----

"Y E S!" Chance piped up in response to Emmelyn, considerably less concerned with stealth. He wasn't all that bothered by Emmelyn using him as a stool, which was arguably more degrading than someone taking his chair. His care for remaining quiet and unseen only shrunk as Mirage left the room. It wasn't at all long before he grew the courage to bring up a paw and tap on the window in an attempt to get the eevee's attention.

"Heeeeeeeeeeey!" he whisper-hissed, "Get offa my chaiiiiir-OW!" he was interrupted with a smack from above before his mouth was thoroughly covered. "lefgofee!" Chance ordered of his sister, "Illbifeu!" he threatened.

Just as Mirage reached to pick the glaceon up, she suddenly got up on her own with an inexplicable newfound sense of grace. The glaceon stepped away and twirled around to meet Mirage, stumbling a bit but catching herself much smoother than the previous fall...s... "Okay, where are we going?" she questioned with perked ears and attentive eyes. Her voice was distinctly light, and despite the slurring still being present, it was almost completely suppressed. Her tail wagged rhythmically as she waited to hear where she needed to come to. She was eagerly looking around at everything as if it was her first time seeing walls, like these walls were the most wonderful walls in the world.


Emmelyn gasped in fear as Chance suddenly began calling out at the eevee in the house. In panic-mode, she smacked the zorua on the head with a paw before frantically reaching to cover his mouth. She didn't know how far away Mom was, nor did she want Chance to make this stranger feel bad. "Bite me and I'll tell mom!" she threatened back at him after hearing what she was pretty sure him saying he was going to bite her. She tried her best to be quiet, but ended up being about as loud as he was.

Between the two of them, Zeal took enough notice of the noise to poke his head out of the bag in curiosity. His ears perked up a bit upon seeing the two heads peering in at him from outside. "Oh, um... hi?" he spoke, crawling cautiously out of his hiding place to properly face them and giving a questioning head-tilt.

Upon being spotted, Emmy froze.

Sova popped right on up with an apparent abundance of energy and joy. The coordination of the glaceon seemed entirely different from what it was just moments ago. The drastic shift took her aback. She pulled her paw away from the glaceon, held it close to her, and watched the ice type with a blank but very much confused face. Where...were they going?? What? Isn't he drunk?

Mirage:

"To...wash...your face?" her voice spoke with a meek and mildly terrified manner. Thiiis...was absolutely not right. His entire demeanor performed a total one-eighty. Her mind processed this for a moment before she decided to ask the question on her mind, "...Arrre yooou...Not-Sova...?" She honestly kind of doubted it. This certainly didn't at all seem like...well, the other personality. Didn't hurt to ask though.

----

Where Emmelyn froze, Chance acted. He gave himself a shake in order to throw his sister off. Once he was done, the tricky fox lifted himself onto the windowsill. He sat himself down on top of it with his paws against the window. He smushed his face up against the glass with a leery eyed look in Zeal's direction.

"Git offa my chaaaaaaiiiiiir!" he whisper-hissed with his paws repeatedly tapping the glass with a sense of urgency important only to him. He didn't seem to care how stupid he looked at that moment, all that mattered was the message was clearly and concisely conveyed and followed.