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Within Northrock, the evening routines of most households were very much the same; but for one unusual pair of rejuves, things went decidedly different.\nBubbles was in the bathtub. This would not in itself be unusual, but she had been in the bath for an hour at this point. In fact, it had been forty minutes since she surfaced, though the amphibian girl seemed quite content to lie at the bottom of the glass bath, making slow cycling motions with her arms and legs, or reading from the specially ordered waterproof pad her parents bought for her. The girl's wide lips opened and closed in lazy chewing motions, her stomach rising and falling in time to her swallows, punctuated by a periodic ejection of bubbles – a behaviour for which she was ultimately named.\nWith the bath so often occupied, it had become normal for Kost to use his parent's en-suite shower. Escorted back to the room by his father, the blond, wolfish boy tended to his own personal eccentricity via a home-made shrine in the corner of the bedroom. Neither of his Karrian parents were especially religious, as was typical for most in Northrock, but they took a tolerant view on such things; faith seemed important to their alien child, and his beliefs caused little if any disruptions to accommodate them.\nAlfred watched the boy kneel before the icon on the corner table, permitting himself a small smile of pride at the crude idol. Two diagonals of polished, silvery metal formed a triangle with the metal base, with thinner diagonals criss-crossing the main supports. The pair had made it together; Alfred had called in a favour to have some metalworking tools brought into Northrock, and persuaded the headmaster at N.C.E. to loan out space in the science lab for a weekend.\nHis wife, Tish, tended to Bubbles, draining some of the water so she could be more easily scrubbed. In place of typical pyjamas, the amphibian girl had an outfit resembling a wetsuit, designed to keep her body warm and moistened without getting the bed wet. As one of, if not the most unusual residents of Northrock, Bubbles required a great many special concessions.\nThe thought drew Alfred's attention back to Kost, softly whispering in his native tongue to the icon – The Gate, he called it – that represented his patron. The Karrian father waited for the boy to fall silent and make a sign, crossing his fingers over his chest in a shape that resembled his holy symbol. With that, Alfred knew he could step in without interrupting whatever the ritual was. “Do you mind if I ask what you pray for?”\nKost glanced up at his reptilian father-figure. “Strength to endure,” he answered quietly, almost as if he were ashamed of his words. “And that He deems my oath unbroken.”\n“You mean your promise to look after Bubbles?” Kost nodded. “You're doing just fine with that, if you ask me.”\nThe boy's ears folded low against his furred skull. “I worry I'm not. She-” the boy's words were sharply interrupted by the crack of a paddle against Bubbles' backside, a sensation the wetsuit offered little protection against. Her long, miserable wails began soon after. “-I can't protect her from days like today.”\nAlfred knelt down to pat the seven year old on the shoulder. “I know spankings hurt, but it's not like they do any lasting harm. In fact, they are meant to do the opposite – to help make you better people.” The Kyyreni boy's expression did not change, so Alfred shifted tactics. “Think of it this way. Not long after you came here you stood on a thorn on the beach. That nasty spike drove pretty deep into your foot, and it hurt a lot.”\n“I remember,” growled the Penny boy, his toes curling in response to the phantom pain of memory.\n“Right. Then you also remember how much it hurt when I yanked it out, and how much it burned when I poured sterilising agent over the wound. Why did I put you through that pain, Kost?”\nFor a moment, the wolfish boy stared at his father, his face expressing a quiet disdain as though he were being presumed stupid. The look faded, and with it his ears crept slowly back upwards. “You needed to take out the thorn and clean the wound so it could heal properly.”\n“That's right. A little pain to cause a long term good. Your paw is completely fixed now, isn't it? Not even a scar! It's the same with spankings, Kost. A sore bottom tonight, and all those other nights, leads to a much better life for both of you later. Painful, but not harmful. Do you understand?”\n“I really wish that didn't make sense,” the boy grumbled, his eyes fixed on Bubbles. She was now getting a cuddle from Tish, and he knew full-well what that meant. Sighing, he glanced back at his father. “I'm getting the paddle too, aren't I?”\n“Afraid so. Come on, you know the drill. Show Bubbles how brave you are.”\nSeeking to appear stoic despite his knotted gut, Kost climbed over his father's lap and settled into the familiar punishment posture. A Karrian claw patted him between the shoulders as a subtle sign the paddling was about to begin, the claw moving to gently hold Kost's thin tail to keep it safe as the wooden instrument of discipline found its mark. A sharp, pained hiss slipped out from between the six-year-old's sharp teeth, followed by a rapid intake of breath to brace for the next stroke. The slow clapping sound of hard wood on furred rear echoed around the Penny Room, with Kost's eyes growing teary as the stinging heat in his rear grew and grew. When the paddling finally ceased, the red-eyed, huffing, trembling youth was allowed back onto his feet, his paws held gently in fatherly claws. “You took that well,” Alfred whispered.\nNeither parent offered Kost any further comfort. They knew him well enough by now to know he wanted to appear strong and independent, not like a cub in need of mother's nuzzling. Bubbles, on the other hand, was welcoming of such things from the first time she'd been put over a lap. Alfred massaged the back of the boy's paws with his thumbs. “I can remember a time when you wouldn't even hold my claws after a paddling.”\nKost shrugged, though it took a few deep breaths before he felt able to reply. “I guess I've gotten used to you,” he forced a smile, but it failed to hide the pain he was still in.\n“Think you know me well enough to give me a hug?” Alfred asked\n“I guess, if you really want me to,” Kost said, but the subtle pull of his paws was the real answer. Alfred dismissed the idea with a quiet shake of his head, content with hand-holding for now.\nWith their comfort time over, Bubbles was shuffled into bed and helped to settled down before the Karrians allowed their furred boy to slip in after her. Kost wore no clothes, his fur more than enough to keep him toasty, and they left his side of the blankets loose rather than tucking him in as they did with Bubbles. “Good night you two. Sleep well,” Tish bade them both farewell as the lights dimmed and both sniffling little penitatas tried to be comfortable.\nSleep would not come easily. It never did. They held each other close, gazing into one another's eyes in the gloom as they waited out the clock. A webbed hand rested on Kost's neck, feeling the hammering pulse beneath. Kost's own paw went to Bubbles' throat, mirroring the gesture. It was a silly thing, a custom born long ago in another life out of a misunderstanding of a Kyyreni turn of phrase, now evolving into a moment of shared intimacy.\nBubbles' pulse slowed to around sixty beats per minute, or as close as Kost could guess. Reading the girl's silently moving lips, he put his own at the mid to high nineties. She stopped the count. “What is it?”\n“Just worried,” Kost whispered back.\n“About?”\n“Nothing I can change. The move, I guess? Our new house is going to be in the middle of nowhere. I liked being in town. We have friends close by.”\nBubbles nodded in agreement. “But we'll be closer to Rilka and Talek, won't we?”\n“True.”\nThe amphibian girl shuffled a little closer to Kost. Smiling, he folded his half of the bedsheet over her to give a little extra insulation. “We should ask for thicker sheets.”\n“Then you'd be too warm.”\n“I don't mind being warm.”\n“You hate being warm,” Bubbles shot back with a frown. “You hate how hot it gets in summer, and you hardly ever wear a coat. You'll go without one even when Ki'reth wears clothes!”\nKost's paw flew up to ward off the accusation, “Easy!” he rasped, “bedtime voice.”\n“I just don't get why you're trying to make yourself miserable.”\nThe boy huffed at the comment. “Look, you're right about me not liking it warm, but you hate the cold far more than I do the warm. I'd rather I be a little uncomfortable than see you suffer.”\n“You worry about me way too much, you know that?”\nA warm smile spread over the boy's muzzle. “I could never worry too much about you.”\n\nSleep found them eventually, but it was still dark when Kost was roused from his bed by his companion shuffling from under the covers. The Kyyreni boy's thermal sense tracked Bubbles as she tip-toed to her own little corner of the room, which contained a water heater and a large, pink mug. A proximity sensor lit the lamp next to the heater, allowing Bubbles to see as she placed the mug under the nozzle and pressed the button. Hot, steaming, lemon-scented water filled the mug, which she held in both hands to savour its radiating warmth. The light died as she moved away, but Kost had turned the bedside lamp on to guide her back.\nSince there was now light to read by, the boy took to one of their books. He would have liked fiction, high adventures with swords and sorcery, but alas the Pennys were typically forced to choose from more educational options. He chose a book Bubbles had requested, simply because he hadn't read it before. It was a technical manual, and given Kost's technical knowledge began and ended with 'try hitting it until it works', it was a bloody tough read. “Does any of this stuff actually make sense to you?” he asked Bubbles as she settled down on the floor next to him, cradling her warm water.\n“It sort of does, but not like it used to,” she confessed, using her right hand to try and draw the shape of her thoughts in the air. “Some of my memories are like a big, black... thing. I can see the edges, I know they're there, but when I try to focus on them my mind slips off, back into the fog.”\nA comforting arm wrapped around her shoulder. “It'll all come back, you'll see. How about some practice? Why don't you see if you can make this... this... co-axial warp drive make sense to me.”\nIn the amber glow of the lamp, Kost saw a gleeful little glimmer in Bubbles' eyes. For a moment, just a moment, he was looking at the brilliant man he had lived beside for most of his life, and almost died beside in an irradiated warp nacelle. “Okay, so a basic warp drive has three key components: the Warp Core, and the two Warp Nacelles. You don't actually need two, but...” the nonsense spilled out of her, and went clean over Kost's head. The basics he grasped, but when she began talking about the more technical theories, like shaping Warp Bubbles or subspace turbulence, it all became a kind of white noise. In Kost's world, a Warp Core was just a big glowy thing that made the ship go fast, and that was it. He liked the world being that simple; technical schematics and advanced calculus were more terrifying than any life-or-death struggle to him.\nThe explanation ended with a sheepish smile. Kost beamed at the blushing girl. “See? You've still got facts in your head!”\n“I mostly just regurgitated what I read yesterday,” she confessed between sips of lemony water.\n“Well it seems like it's sticking.”\nThey read together for a while, with Kost mostly looking at diagrams or, increasingly, watching Bubbles read instead. Outside, a half-hearted spring shower pattered against the window for a spell, but it lacked the enthusiasm to stay. The wolfish boy's paws idly twitched and curled, forming notes on an imaginary instrument as a way to use the night more productively; neither child needed to sleep nearly as much as a Karrian did, so he was confident no parent would be poking a snout in for hours yet.\nBubbles tilted her head, noting the beaming grin on Kost's muzzle. “What's got you so amused?”\n“Just thinking about our friends, what they'd think of us being out of bed at such a forbidden hour.”\nThe amphibian girl covered her wide mouth to stifle a giggle. “Well we both know what Rilka and Talek would do!”\n“Oh yes. They'd be rutting like its Revelry!”\n“Do you ever get as frisky as they do?” Bubbles punctuated the question with a subtle glance down at her companion's bare sheath.\n“Sure, but I have self control – unlike some people we know! Those kinds of urges pass, so long as I've got better things to focus on.”\n“Good to know!” the girl giggled, snuggling against the warm fur of Kost's chest to find a more comfortable spot to read. They stayed together, quietly cuddling, until the subtle shift in hew behind the curtains warned of an approaching dawn. The pair dutifully climbed back into bed and settled down to steal a brief spell of light sleep prior to their parent's return.\n\nThe day of the move was a day off school. Kost and Bubbles were encouraged with kind words and subtle gestures of their paddle to help ensure everything they owned was packed away in properly labelled boxes. When it came to their books, toys, and other personal possessions the boxes were gone over three times with a checklist to make sure nothing went missing. After that, a last-minute sweep of the house was made to confirm every inch was clean for whoever moved in afterwards. With their entire lives in boxes, carried on their backs or, for the paddle, held in a parent's claw, the family left the house one last time and went in search of an activity for the day.\nTheir route took them past a long warehouse, which Bubbles gazed at with hungry eyes. An indoor beach, or so playground rumours claimed; a place where a family could sunbathe or paddle in the warm, salt free water, with no fear of Northrock's distinctive gloom or wind-chill ruining the day. That adventure was for another day, it seemed.\nAlfred eventually called a halt at a tall building towards the north end of town, the signage for which filled his young charges with giddy glee. The word ARCADE stood out in neon, beckoning all with its promise of fun and excitement. “Kost, Bubbles, I expect you both to show a little restraint,” he warned, giving the pair a reminder that a penitatas was rarely permitted to cut loose and give in to their inner child entirely. Yet neither could keep a smile from their faces as they were escorted in to the wonderful world of games; table tennis and air hockey boards competed with hoop-throw games and whack-a-moles for their attention, along with a ball pit that practically screamed for them to dive straight in! A handful of rejuves were enjoying themselves there already, none of them penitatas. Confronted with more games than they knew what to do with, the hours flew by; their favourite attraction was a maze built under a glass floor, its walls and floor styled like an ancient tomb, with control consoles placed along the walls nearby to remotely pilot a drone within that maze. Alfred and Tish watched with proud smiles as Bubbles took the controls of Drone #4, and Kost darted about to find the machine as their game timer started to count down. He began barking out precise instructions, trying his best to steer Bubbles through the twists and turns to find the four 'treasures' needed to win the game.\nThey lost, but their attempt saw them get halfway to their goal. “Why not switch roles? Give Kost a go at piloting?” Tish suggested, and Bubbles hurried to find the Drone.\n“Ready?” Kost asked, his finger over the start button.\n“No! Don't go yet!” the froggy girl began to spin around, fingers pointing back and forth at different points of the maze. Her wide lips flapped silently, both reptilian parents curious as to her flurry. “Ready!” she called at last. “When you start, take an immediate left, then the second left!”\nBubbles scampered after the drone, waddling about in a wide stance to try and keep it between her legs as she followed Kost's journey. “Okay! Now right! The first treasure is-”\n“I remember this bit, it's on the left after the green wall!”\n“Right! But as soon as you get it, double back!”\nKost glanced over his shoulder. “But that's going away from the second treasure!”\n“You can get that one last! This way you avoid the other drones!”\nThe announcement made Alfred raise an eyebrow. One lone voluntaras was trying his luck, but all the other player vehicles were stationary hazards in the maze. As Kost wound into the second treasure, Bubbles sang out to him, “Forwards for a count of three, doo-dah, doo-dah! Then take the first right you see!”\n“Oh doo-dah day!” Kost laughed along with her little song.\nWith instructions in hand, Bubbles scurried over to the older Karrian and politely tapped him on the shoulder, “could you turn left here, please?”\nThe boy glanced down, puzzled, and shrugged. “Yeah, sure. I just ran out of time anyway.”\n“Thanks!” she bounced back to the maze as Kost wound along. “Turn left here and follow the outer wall! The path should be clear right up until treasure three!”\n“No turns?”\n“Take every right turn you find until you hit the prize!” the little girl was bouncing up and down with excitement at this point. Tish, with some reluctance, stepped forward with her paws raised.\n“Bubbles? Inside voice. Inside behaviour.” the simple words did much to temper her wild enthusiasm.\n“Sorry!” the girl blurted out.\n“It's okay. I know you're having fun,” he pointed sharply down to return the girl's focus to the game, and immediately Bubbles started calling out directions. Even the voluntaras boy was curious now, nodding along and whispering softly to himself as Bubbles seemed to unerringly know the fastest path through the many twists and turns of the maze. With scarcely ten seconds to spare, Kost pulled up to the final altar. Lights above his console flashed up gold, and a fanfare played to announce their triumph. This was joined by the soft applause of their parents.\n“Well done! That's a high note to leave on!” Tish grinned, though both rejuves were sad to learn their day of fun was already over. The pair fell into line, with Kost softly boasting how he won most of the games they'd played against one another.\nOutside and heading south, Alfred indulged in a little curiosity. “Your past is your own so you don't have to answer, but did you ever plunder any ancient tombs?”\n“Not that I remember,” Bubbles said, ever more eager to offer information than Kost.\nMore guarded, Kost corrected the girl, “We did raid an archaeological site once, but I don't think it was a tomb. Just a ruined city or something.”\n“Do you ever miss that life, or aspects of it?”\nBubbles nodded slowly. “I miss my ship. I hardly ever had permission to leave it, and when I did it was usually to help strip parts from another vessel we'd made surrender. I know a lot of what we did was wrong, but the ship was my world; keeping her working was all that mattered to me. I don't miss being a pirate, but I miss the vessel.”\n“What about you, Kost?” Tish asked, noting how Kost became increasingly defensive in posture the more Bubbles talked.\nHuffing out his desire for silence, Kost briefly glanced at Bubbles before surrendering. “I hated my life most of the time. It was full of long, boring days with little to do but wait for the next mission, and the missions themselves were terrifying. I'd be waiting at the airlock to storm a ship, imagining how a disruptor bolt would blow my head off as soon as I went through; or riding in a shuttle, expecting the whole thing to break apart around me and plunge me into space. I was always so terrified of death. It's stupid, I know, but it's true all the same.”\n“Stupid? Why?” Alfred asked, noting how Kost's normally confident demeanour seemed to be fading fast. There was an unusually distant look upon his muzzle as he spoke.\n“Most of the time we took our marks without much struggle; merchants would rather lose a little cargo than their lives. But... other days...” The boy's limbs began to tremble and is breathing became ragged, prompting Alfred to place a comforting paw on the lad's head. “When we had to fight, either because the mark wouldn't back down or the job demanded we take on professional soldiers, those were something else. Gun and blade, fire and smoke, trampling over bodies of friend and foe alike. Some of them were still screaming, or they'd claw at your legs begging for mercy, or begging for death. But you couldn't stop to help or you'd be one of them...”\n“Kost, it's okay,” Alfred began, but the boy's trembling ceased. His breathing calmed, and a cold clarity formed in his eyes.\n“Those were the only days I truly felt alive,” he whispered, then glanced up at his father and added, “I know how that sounds, but it's not what you think. When it was all over I would drink, take drugs, do whatever I could to blot out the memories. I just wanted – [i]needed[/i] to shut it all out out so I could escape. Every time it got harder. Every mission it took longer to come back to something like normal. But... but in the moment, when every moment could have been my last, there was... a kind of release.”\nAlfred's paw slid down, stroking the boy's head softly. “Well now, it seems to me you're finally starting to open up. Thank you, Kost.”\nA rasping little huff slipped from his maw. “I guess all that talk about 'sharing' from Persephone finally sunk in.”\n“I think it would be good for you to talk about your past with her, if you haven't already. If you don't mind, we'll book a visit for you soon.”\n“I-” Kost paused mid-protest, having caught Bubbles' eye. The girl looked hopeful, longing even. “Alright,” he relented, and his amphibian friend smiled at his choice.\n\nThe walk to their new home took them south and out of the urban sprawl. They were more typical of mainstream, modern homes than those found in the town centre; low built with rounded features. Seven houses formed a cul-de-sac, all with matching blue rooftops. The house at the very bottom still had a moving van parked outside. The driver remained only until Alfred signed the paperwork, the house itself having been left unlocked – the idea of a burglary in Northrock was utterly laughable.\nTish and Alfred insisted on covering their children's eyes as they walked into their new home, letting them see again once they reached the living room. The only detail either of them took in was the western wall – it was transparent, revealing a sizeable conservatory beyond, dominated by a large swimming pool. To the north end of the pool was a changing area, with storage, a shower, and an airlock arrangement of glass doors that allowed access to and from the pool. Both Pennys stood in awe at the sight.\nGiggling to herself, Tish led Bubbles by the hand towards the pool entrance. “Come on, little lady! Make sure to shower before you get in.”\n“We have a pool!” Bubbles squeaked, the reality setting in as the family passed through the airlock. A blast of warm air greeted them on the other side.\n“Remember to only open one door at a time, and use the air cycler,” Alfred warned the pair. “We'd like to keep the damp out of the rest of the house!” He wasn't sure if Bubbles registered his words, for her entire focus was on getting into the water as fast as possible. In the end, Tish surrendered and let the child loose as soon as she was out of her wetsuit, smirking quietly as Bubbles bounded forward and dove into the shallow end. Both parents winced, fearing she'd strike the bottom, but the rippling form of the girl appeared under the water at the far end. She twisted, braced on the far wall, and shot back to the other end. By the time Kost had stepped up to the pool's shallow end, Bubbles had made four complete lengths.\n“We have a pool!” the girl squealed again as she broke the surface, drunk with glee and laughing hysterically.\n“I noticed,” Kost chuckled as he slipped into the cool water, allowing himself to be dragged along by Bubbles until he was treading water in the centre of the pool. The girl submerged and swam circles around him before popping back up with a splash.\nFrom the edge of the water, Tish called out, “We're going to make sure everything's where it should be! You two can play together until we're done!”\nAn amphibian limb wrapped around Kost's waist as Bubbles' head broke the surface again. There was a pause before she took a lungful of air again. “I can't believe we have a pool!”\n“Must be why you keep mentioning it,” Kost laughed back, flicking a playful pawful of water at the girl's face.\n“Our parents are the best!”\n“Yeah. Guess they're not so bad. Gimmie a minute, okay? I need to get out.”\n“Why?” Bubbles' face shifted instantly from gleeful to anxious as Kost began to paddle for the nearest ladder.\n“I need the lat, okay? Not sure our parents want us pissing in the new pool!” He scrambled up the ladder, fur heavy with she sheer volume of water trapped between the follicles, and scurried into the archway leading to the changing area. Hot, fierce blasts of air sent sheets of water pattering into the grille beneath his feet, leaving him feel like steamed meat as he headed for the door as quickly as he could. He ran for the stairwell and thudded up, finding his new room easily enough as it had a transparent wall overlooking the landing. His father was unpacking a box in the corner, but Kost simply ran over to the sink and leaned upon it, shuddering as his poise broke at last.\n“Kost? Are you alright?” the Karrian asked as he approached the shuddering, blubbering child. “What's happened?”\nThe wolfish boy turned, tears streaking down his face, jaw open and quivering. Kost struggled for several seconds to form words before hurling himself forward with the same force he'd lunged at the sink, his young arms wrapping around his father as he buried his muzzle into the adult's stomach. There he stood, sobbing, for several seconds. Alfred merely stroked Kost's head until the Kyyreni boy pulled away enough to meet his gaze. “Thank you,” he whispered.\n“For what?”\n“The pool. You got it for her, didn't you?”\nAlfred smiled as he pushed Kost away enough to let himself kneel, coming closer to the boy's eye level. “Yes, we did. That doesn't mean she's not getting her licks though; nor does it mean we've forgotten about your needs either.”\nWith a fresh blub, the boy redoubled his grateful hug, throwing his arms around Alfred's neck. The Karrian gladly returned the gesture. “I've been waiting a long time for this.”\n\nAlfred took the time to wash Kost's face before he rejoined Bubbles, just so the girl wouldn't know he'd been crying. The pair played in the water until dinner time, and a further treat was given to celebrate settling into their new abode; a family night in front of the holo for a few cartoons before a welcome home spanking and an early bedtime. Kost was put to bed alone; Bubbles was allowed to sleep in the pool, much to the girl's explosive delight.\nThe Kyyreni boy woke up somewhere past midnight in an unfamiliar place; his dreaming mind had expected to wake into his old room, and it took a few seconds to shake off the disorientation. Turning on the bedside lamp gave him an amber glow by which to sweep the room and plot the key locations: the bathroom space, writing desk, Bubbles' hot water machine tucked next to a wardrobe, a little reading corner with their musical instruments leaning against the bookshelf, and his prayer corner. The boy found himself studying the home-made icon to his patron, and not for the first time wished there were some priest who could help him make sense of the world. Shaking off the doubts, he chose instead to take up his guitar, pressing it to the bare fur of his chest and heading downstairs into the silent, unlit house.\nThe pool glowed as he entered the conservatory. Soft, underwater lights around the bottom edge produced a faint halo that outlined the amphibian girl stretched out under the water. The Kyyreni boy sat down at the edge halfway along the pool, sitting with his back towards the sea, and watched her. A sharp, unpleasant thought, like a splinter in his mind, pushed its way up the back of his skull: could Bubbles drown? She was perfectly still, after all... but as if reading his thoughts the faintest of ripples danced across the pool's surface. She was still 'breathing' if that was the right term for whatever she did underwater. As he watched, Bubbles stirred and began to rise, her grinning face a gradient of greens, yellows and pale beige, all blue-shifted by the light below.\nKost made a rough bed for himself out of towels and lay down, reaching with a paw to cup under her chin. He felt the damp press of her fingers against his own neck; Bubbles' pulse was faster than normal, but she was having to swim to keep position. That, and she'd found herself in a personal paradise – a racing heart was to be expected.\nThe pair broke away. Kost dried his paw on the towel before settling into a sitting position, legs dipped into the water for Bubbles to cling to as he began to strum his guitar. His bedroom was closer to the pool than that of his parents, not that he cared much about being caught either way. He strummed the chords of an old folk song, a duet between a warrior and his love.\nWithout missing a beat, Bubbles began to softly sing the words of the lover's wife. “[i]The gold you find would fix the roof o'er our heads. The silver would buy a fine meal. But if e'er you left me and never returned, 'tis a wound that no riches can heal. For you are my treasure, my one and true love; for you are all that I hold dear. I'll gladly be hungry or shivering cold, so long as I have you right here.[/i]”\nAlfred and Tish found the pair together when they awoke next morning; Kost was stretched out on a bed of towels, sleeping with one paw in the water. They scolded the boy for sneaking out of his room and warned he'd be in for a hiding if he ever did it again, but they were smiling as they said it.", "writing_bbcode_parsed": "Bedtime was closing in. Within Northrock, the evening routines of most households were very much the same; but for one unusual pair of rejuves, things went decidedly different.
Bubbles was in the bathtub. This would not in itself be unusual, but she had been in the bath for an hour at this point. In fact, it had been forty minutes since she surfaced, though the amphibian girl seemed quite content to lie at the bottom of the glass bath, making slow cycling motions with her arms and legs, or reading from the specially ordered waterproof pad her parents bought for her. The girl's wide lips opened and closed in lazy chewing motions, her stomach rising and falling in time to her swallows, punctuated by a periodic ejection of bubbles – a behaviour for which she was ultimately named.
With the bath so often occupied, it had become normal for Kost to use his parent's en-suite shower. Escorted back to the room by his father, the blond, wolfish boy tended to his own personal eccentricity via a home-made shrine in the corner of the bedroom. Neither of his Karrian parents were especially religious, as was typical for most in Northrock, but they took a tolerant view on such things; faith seemed important to their alien child, and his beliefs caused little if any disruptions to accommodate them.
Alfred watched the boy kneel before the icon on the corner table, permitting himself a small smile of pride at the crude idol. Two diagonals of polished, silvery metal formed a triangle with the metal base, with thinner diagonals criss-crossing the main supports. The pair had made it together; Alfred had called in a favour to have some metalworking tools brought into Northrock, and persuaded the headmaster at N.C.E. to loan out space in the science lab for a weekend.
His wife, Tish, tended to Bubbles, draining some of the water so she could be more easily scrubbed. In place of typical pyjamas, the amphibian girl had an outfit resembling a wetsuit, designed to keep her body warm and moistened without getting the bed wet. As one of, if not the most unusual residents of Northrock, Bubbles required a great many special concessions.
The thought drew Alfred's attention back to Kost, softly whispering in his native tongue to the icon – The Gate, he called it – that represented his patron. The Karrian father waited for the boy to fall silent and make a sign, crossing his fingers over his chest in a shape that resembled his holy symbol. With that, Alfred knew he could step in without interrupting whatever the ritual was. “Do you mind if I ask what you pray for?”
Kost glanced up at his reptilian father-figure. “Strength to endure,” he answered quietly, almost as if he were ashamed of his words. “And that He deems my oath unbroken.”
“You mean your promise to look after Bubbles?” Kost nodded. “You're doing just fine with that, if you ask me.”
The boy's ears folded low against his furred skull. “I worry I'm not. She-” the boy's words were sharply interrupted by the crack of a paddle against Bubbles' backside, a sensation the wetsuit offered little protection against. Her long, miserable wails began soon after. “-I can't protect her from days like today.”
Alfred knelt down to pat the seven year old on the shoulder. “I know spankings hurt, but it's not like they do any lasting harm. In fact, they are meant to do the opposite – to help make you better people.” The Kyyreni boy's expression did not change, so Alfred shifted tactics. “Think of it this way. Not long after you came here you stood on a thorn on the beach. That nasty spike drove pretty deep into your foot, and it hurt a lot.”
“I remember,” growled the Penny boy, his toes curling in response to the phantom pain of memory.
“Right. Then you also remember how much it hurt when I yanked it out, and how much it burned when I poured sterilising agent over the wound. Why did I put you through that pain, Kost?”
For a moment, the wolfish boy stared at his father, his face expressing a quiet disdain as though he were being presumed stupid. The look faded, and with it his ears crept slowly back upwards. “You needed to take out the thorn and clean the wound so it could heal properly.”
“That's right. A little pain to cause a long term good. Your paw is completely fixed now, isn't it? Not even a scar! It's the same with spankings, Kost. A sore bottom tonight, and all those other nights, leads to a much better life for both of you later. Painful, but not harmful. Do you understand?”
“I really wish that didn't make sense,” the boy grumbled, his eyes fixed on Bubbles. She was now getting a cuddle from Tish, and he knew full-well what that meant. Sighing, he glanced back at his father. “I'm getting the paddle too, aren't I?”
“Afraid so. Come on, you know the drill. Show Bubbles how brave you are.”
Seeking to appear stoic despite his knotted gut, Kost climbed over his father's lap and settled into the familiar punishment posture. A Karrian claw patted him between the shoulders as a subtle sign the paddling was about to begin, the claw moving to gently hold Kost's thin tail to keep it safe as the wooden instrument of discipline found its mark. A sharp, pained hiss slipped out from between the six-year-old's sharp teeth, followed by a rapid intake of breath to brace for the next stroke. The slow clapping sound of hard wood on furred rear echoed around the Penny Room, with Kost's eyes growing teary as the stinging heat in his rear grew and grew. When the paddling finally ceased, the red-eyed, huffing, trembling youth was allowed back onto his feet, his paws held gently in fatherly claws. “You took that well,” Alfred whispered.
Neither parent offered Kost any further comfort. They knew him well enough by now to know he wanted to appear strong and independent, not like a cub in need of mother's nuzzling. Bubbles, on the other hand, was welcoming of such things from the first time she'd been put over a lap. Alfred massaged the back of the boy's paws with his thumbs. “I can remember a time when you wouldn't even hold my claws after a paddling.”
Kost shrugged, though it took a few deep breaths before he felt able to reply. “I guess I've gotten used to you,” he forced a smile, but it failed to hide the pain he was still in.
“Think you know me well enough to give me a hug?” Alfred asked
“I guess, if you really want me to,” Kost said, but the subtle pull of his paws was the real answer. Alfred dismissed the idea with a quiet shake of his head, content with hand-holding for now.
With their comfort time over, Bubbles was shuffled into bed and helped to settled down before the Karrians allowed their furred boy to slip in after her. Kost wore no clothes, his fur more than enough to keep him toasty, and they left his side of the blankets loose rather than tucking him in as they did with Bubbles. “Good night you two. Sleep well,” Tish bade them both farewell as the lights dimmed and both sniffling little penitatas tried to be comfortable.
Sleep would not come easily. It never did. They held each other close, gazing into one another's eyes in the gloom as they waited out the clock. A webbed hand rested on Kost's neck, feeling the hammering pulse beneath. Kost's own paw went to Bubbles' throat, mirroring the gesture. It was a silly thing, a custom born long ago in another life out of a misunderstanding of a Kyyreni turn of phrase, now evolving into a moment of shared intimacy.
Bubbles' pulse slowed to around sixty beats per minute, or as close as Kost could guess. Reading the girl's silently moving lips, he put his own at the mid to high nineties. She stopped the count. “What is it?”
“Just worried,” Kost whispered back.
“About?”
“Nothing I can change. The move, I guess? Our new house is going to be in the middle of nowhere. I liked being in town. We have friends close by.”
Bubbles nodded in agreement. “But we'll be closer to Rilka and Talek, won't we?”
“True.”
The amphibian girl shuffled a little closer to Kost. Smiling, he folded his half of the bedsheet over her to give a little extra insulation. “We should ask for thicker sheets.”
“Then you'd be too warm.”
“I don't mind being warm.”
“You hate being warm,” Bubbles shot back with a frown. “You hate how hot it gets in summer, and you hardly ever wear a coat. You'll go without one even when Ki'reth wears clothes!”
Kost's paw flew up to ward off the accusation, “Easy!” he rasped, “bedtime voice.”
“I just don't get why you're trying to make yourself miserable.”
The boy huffed at the comment. “Look, you're right about me not liking it warm, but you hate the cold far more than I do the warm. I'd rather I be a little uncomfortable than see you suffer.”
“You worry about me way too much, you know that?”
A warm smile spread over the boy's muzzle. “I could never worry too much about you.”

Sleep found them eventually, but it was still dark when Kost was roused from his bed by his companion shuffling from under the covers. The Kyyreni boy's thermal sense tracked Bubbles as she tip-toed to her own little corner of the room, which contained a water heater and a large, pink mug. A proximity sensor lit the lamp next to the heater, allowing Bubbles to see as she placed the mug under the nozzle and pressed the button. Hot, steaming, lemon-scented water filled the mug, which she held in both hands to savour its radiating warmth. The light died as she moved away, but Kost had turned the bedside lamp on to guide her back.
Since there was now light to read by, the boy took to one of their books. He would have liked fiction, high adventures with swords and sorcery, but alas the Pennys were typically forced to choose from more educational options. He chose a book Bubbles had requested, simply because he hadn't read it before. It was a technical manual, and given Kost's technical knowledge began and ended with 'try hitting it until it works', it was a bloody tough read. “Does any of this stuff actually make sense to you?” he asked Bubbles as she settled down on the floor next to him, cradling her warm water.
“It sort of does, but not like it used to,” she confessed, using her right hand to try and draw the shape of her thoughts in the air. “Some of my memories are like a big, black... thing. I can see the edges, I know they're there, but when I try to focus on them my mind slips off, back into the fog.”
A comforting arm wrapped around her shoulder. “It'll all come back, you'll see. How about some practice? Why don't you see if you can make this... this... co-axial warp drive make sense to me.”
In the amber glow of the lamp, Kost saw a gleeful little glimmer in Bubbles' eyes. For a moment, just a moment, he was looking at the brilliant man he had lived beside for most of his life, and almost died beside in an irradiated warp nacelle. “Okay, so a basic warp drive has three key components: the Warp Core, and the two Warp Nacelles. You don't actually need two, but...” the nonsense spilled out of her, and went clean over Kost's head. The basics he grasped, but when she began talking about the more technical theories, like shaping Warp Bubbles or subspace turbulence, it all became a kind of white noise. In Kost's world, a Warp Core was just a big glowy thing that made the ship go fast, and that was it. He liked the world being that simple; technical schematics and advanced calculus were more terrifying than any life-or-death struggle to him.
The explanation ended with a sheepish smile. Kost beamed at the blushing girl. “See? You've still got facts in your head!”
“I mostly just regurgitated what I read yesterday,” she confessed between sips of lemony water.
“Well it seems like it's sticking.”
They read together for a while, with Kost mostly looking at diagrams or, increasingly, watching Bubbles read instead. Outside, a half-hearted spring shower pattered against the window for a spell, but it lacked the enthusiasm to stay. The wolfish boy's paws idly twitched and curled, forming notes on an imaginary instrument as a way to use the night more productively; neither child needed to sleep nearly as much as a Karrian did, so he was confident no parent would be poking a snout in for hours yet.
Bubbles tilted her head, noting the beaming grin on Kost's muzzle. “What's got you so amused?”
“Just thinking about our friends, what they'd think of us being out of bed at such a forbidden hour.”
The amphibian girl covered her wide mouth to stifle a giggle. “Well we both know what Rilka and Talek would do!”
“Oh yes. They'd be rutting like its Revelry!”
“Do you ever get as frisky as they do?” Bubbles punctuated the question with a subtle glance down at her companion's bare sheath.
“Sure, but I have self control – unlike some people we know! Those kinds of urges pass, so long as I've got better things to focus on.”
“Good to know!” the girl giggled, snuggling against the warm fur of Kost's chest to find a more comfortable spot to read. They stayed together, quietly cuddling, until the subtle shift in hew behind the curtains warned of an approaching dawn. The pair dutifully climbed back into bed and settled down to steal a brief spell of light sleep prior to their parent's return.

The day of the move was a day off school. Kost and Bubbles were encouraged with kind words and subtle gestures of their paddle to help ensure everything they owned was packed away in properly labelled boxes. When it came to their books, toys, and other personal possessions the boxes were gone over three times with a checklist to make sure nothing went missing. After that, a last-minute sweep of the house was made to confirm every inch was clean for whoever moved in afterwards. With their entire lives in boxes, carried on their backs or, for the paddle, held in a parent's claw, the family left the house one last time and went in search of an activity for the day.
Their route took them past a long warehouse, which Bubbles gazed at with hungry eyes. An indoor beach, or so playground rumours claimed; a place where a family could sunbathe or paddle in the warm, salt free water, with no fear of Northrock's distinctive gloom or wind-chill ruining the day. That adventure was for another day, it seemed.
Alfred eventually called a halt at a tall building towards the north end of town, the signage for which filled his young charges with giddy glee. The word ARCADE stood out in neon, beckoning all with its promise of fun and excitement. “Kost, Bubbles, I expect you both to show a little restraint,” he warned, giving the pair a reminder that a penitatas was rarely permitted to cut loose and give in to their inner child entirely. Yet neither could keep a smile from their faces as they were escorted in to the wonderful world of games; table tennis and air hockey boards competed with hoop-throw games and whack-a-moles for their attention, along with a ball pit that practically screamed for them to dive straight in! A handful of rejuves were enjoying themselves there already, none of them penitatas. Confronted with more games than they knew what to do with, the hours flew by; their favourite attraction was a maze built under a glass floor, its walls and floor styled like an ancient tomb, with control consoles placed along the walls nearby to remotely pilot a drone within that maze. Alfred and Tish watched with proud smiles as Bubbles took the controls of Drone #4, and Kost darted about to find the machine as their game timer started to count down. He began barking out precise instructions, trying his best to steer Bubbles through the twists and turns to find the four 'treasures' needed to win the game.
They lost, but their attempt saw them get halfway to their goal. “Why not switch roles? Give Kost a go at piloting?” Tish suggested, and Bubbles hurried to find the Drone.
“Ready?” Kost asked, his finger over the start button.
“No! Don't go yet!” the froggy girl began to spin around, fingers pointing back and forth at different points of the maze. Her wide lips flapped silently, both reptilian parents curious as to her flurry. “Ready!” she called at last. “When you start, take an immediate left, then the second left!”
Bubbles scampered after the drone, waddling about in a wide stance to try and keep it between her legs as she followed Kost's journey. “Okay! Now right! The first treasure is-”
“I remember this bit, it's on the left after the green wall!”
“Right! But as soon as you get it, double back!”
Kost glanced over his shoulder. “But that's going away from the second treasure!”
“You can get that one last! This way you avoid the other drones!”
The announcement made Alfred raise an eyebrow. One lone voluntaras was trying his luck, but all the other player vehicles were stationary hazards in the maze. As Kost wound into the second treasure, Bubbles sang out to him, “Forwards for a count of three, doo-dah, doo-dah! Then take the first right you see!”
“Oh doo-dah day!” Kost laughed along with her little song.
With instructions in hand, Bubbles scurried over to the older Karrian and politely tapped him on the shoulder, “could you turn left here, please?”
The boy glanced down, puzzled, and shrugged. “Yeah, sure. I just ran out of time anyway.”
“Thanks!” she bounced back to the maze as Kost wound along. “Turn left here and follow the outer wall! The path should be clear right up until treasure three!”
“No turns?”
“Take every right turn you find until you hit the prize!” the little girl was bouncing up and down with excitement at this point. Tish, with some reluctance, stepped forward with her paws raised.
“Bubbles? Inside voice. Inside behaviour.” the simple words did much to temper her wild enthusiasm.
“Sorry!” the girl blurted out.
“It's okay. I know you're having fun,” he pointed sharply down to return the girl's focus to the game, and immediately Bubbles started calling out directions. Even the voluntaras boy was curious now, nodding along and whispering softly to himself as Bubbles seemed to unerringly know the fastest path through the many twists and turns of the maze. With scarcely ten seconds to spare, Kost pulled up to the final altar. Lights above his console flashed up gold, and a fanfare played to announce their triumph. This was joined by the soft applause of their parents.
“Well done! That's a high note to leave on!” Tish grinned, though both rejuves were sad to learn their day of fun was already over. The pair fell into line, with Kost softly boasting how he won most of the games they'd played against one another.
Outside and heading south, Alfred indulged in a little curiosity. “Your past is your own so you don't have to answer, but did you ever plunder any ancient tombs?”
“Not that I remember,” Bubbles said, ever more eager to offer information than Kost.
More guarded, Kost corrected the girl, “We did raid an archaeological site once, but I don't think it was a tomb. Just a ruined city or something.”
“Do you ever miss that life, or aspects of it?”
Bubbles nodded slowly. “I miss my ship. I hardly ever had permission to leave it, and when I did it was usually to help strip parts from another vessel we'd made surrender. I know a lot of what we did was wrong, but the ship was my world; keeping her working was all that mattered to me. I don't miss being a pirate, but I miss the vessel.”
“What about you, Kost?” Tish asked, noting how Kost became increasingly defensive in posture the more Bubbles talked.
Huffing out his desire for silence, Kost briefly glanced at Bubbles before surrendering. “I hated my life most of the time. It was full of long, boring days with little to do but wait for the next mission, and the missions themselves were terrifying. I'd be waiting at the airlock to storm a ship, imagining how a disruptor bolt would blow my head off as soon as I went through; or riding in a shuttle, expecting the whole thing to break apart around me and plunge me into space. I was always so terrified of death. It's stupid, I know, but it's true all the same.”
“Stupid? Why?” Alfred asked, noting how Kost's normally confident demeanour seemed to be fading fast. There was an unusually distant look upon his muzzle as he spoke.
“Most of the time we took our marks without much struggle; merchants would rather lose a little cargo than their lives. But... other days...” The boy's limbs began to tremble and is breathing became ragged, prompting Alfred to place a comforting paw on the lad's head. “When we had to fight, either because the mark wouldn't back down or the job demanded we take on professional soldiers, those were something else. Gun and blade, fire and smoke, trampling over bodies of friend and foe alike. Some of them were still screaming, or they'd claw at your legs begging for mercy, or begging for death. But you couldn't stop to help or you'd be one of them...”
“Kost, it's okay,” Alfred began, but the boy's trembling ceased. His breathing calmed, and a cold clarity formed in his eyes.
“Those were the only days I truly felt alive,” he whispered, then glanced up at his father and added, “I know how that sounds, but it's not what you think. When it was all over I would drink, take drugs, do whatever I could to blot out the memories. I just wanted – needed to shut it all out out so I could escape. Every time it got harder. Every mission it took longer to come back to something like normal. But... but in the moment, when every moment could have been my last, there was... a kind of release.”
Alfred's paw slid down, stroking the boy's head softly. “Well now, it seems to me you're finally starting to open up. Thank you, Kost.”
A rasping little huff slipped from his maw. “I guess all that talk about 'sharing' from Persephone finally sunk in.”
“I think it would be good for you to talk about your past with her, if you haven't already. If you don't mind, we'll book a visit for you soon.”
“I-” Kost paused mid-protest, having caught Bubbles' eye. The girl looked hopeful, longing even. “Alright,” he relented, and his amphibian friend smiled at his choice.

The walk to their new home took them south and out of the urban sprawl. They were more typical of mainstream, modern homes than those found in the town centre; low built with rounded features. Seven houses formed a cul-de-sac, all with matching blue rooftops. The house at the very bottom still had a moving van parked outside. The driver remained only until Alfred signed the paperwork, the house itself having been left unlocked – the idea of a burglary in Northrock was utterly laughable.
Tish and Alfred insisted on covering their children's eyes as they walked into their new home, letting them see again once they reached the living room. The only detail either of them took in was the western wall – it was transparent, revealing a sizeable conservatory beyond, dominated by a large swimming pool. To the north end of the pool was a changing area, with storage, a shower, and an airlock arrangement of glass doors that allowed access to and from the pool. Both Pennys stood in awe at the sight.
Giggling to herself, Tish led Bubbles by the hand towards the pool entrance. “Come on, little lady! Make sure to shower before you get in.”
“We have a pool!” Bubbles squeaked, the reality setting in as the family passed through the airlock. A blast of warm air greeted them on the other side.
“Remember to only open one door at a time, and use the air cycler,” Alfred warned the pair. “We'd like to keep the damp out of the rest of the house!” He wasn't sure if Bubbles registered his words, for her entire focus was on getting into the water as fast as possible. In the end, Tish surrendered and let the child loose as soon as she was out of her wetsuit, smirking quietly as Bubbles bounded forward and dove into the shallow end. Both parents winced, fearing she'd strike the bottom, but the rippling form of the girl appeared under the water at the far end. She twisted, braced on the far wall, and shot back to the other end. By the time Kost had stepped up to the pool's shallow end, Bubbles had made four complete lengths.
“We have a pool!” the girl squealed again as she broke the surface, drunk with glee and laughing hysterically.
“I noticed,” Kost chuckled as he slipped into the cool water, allowing himself to be dragged along by Bubbles until he was treading water in the centre of the pool. The girl submerged and swam circles around him before popping back up with a splash.
From the edge of the water, Tish called out, “We're going to make sure everything's where it should be! You two can play together until we're done!”
An amphibian limb wrapped around Kost's waist as Bubbles' head broke the surface again. There was a pause before she took a lungful of air again. “I can't believe we have a pool!”
“Must be why you keep mentioning it,” Kost laughed back, flicking a playful pawful of water at the girl's face.
“Our parents are the best!”
“Yeah. Guess they're not so bad. Gimmie a minute, okay? I need to get out.”
“Why?” Bubbles' face shifted instantly from gleeful to anxious as Kost began to paddle for the nearest ladder.
“I need the lat, okay? Not sure our parents want us pissing in the new pool!” He scrambled up the ladder, fur heavy with she sheer volume of water trapped between the follicles, and scurried into the archway leading to the changing area. Hot, fierce blasts of air sent sheets of water pattering into the grille beneath his feet, leaving him feel like steamed meat as he headed for the door as quickly as he could. He ran for the stairwell and thudded up, finding his new room easily enough as it had a transparent wall overlooking the landing. His father was unpacking a box in the corner, but Kost simply ran over to the sink and leaned upon it, shuddering as his poise broke at last.
“Kost? Are you alright?” the Karrian asked as he approached the shuddering, blubbering child. “What's happened?”
The wolfish boy turned, tears streaking down his face, jaw open and quivering. Kost struggled for several seconds to form words before hurling himself forward with the same force he'd lunged at the sink, his young arms wrapping around his father as he buried his muzzle into the adult's stomach. There he stood, sobbing, for several seconds. Alfred merely stroked Kost's head until the Kyyreni boy pulled away enough to meet his gaze. “Thank you,” he whispered.
“For what?”
“The pool. You got it for her, didn't you?”
Alfred smiled as he pushed Kost away enough to let himself kneel, coming closer to the boy's eye level. “Yes, we did. That doesn't mean she's not getting her licks though; nor does it mean we've forgotten about your needs either.”
With a fresh blub, the boy redoubled his grateful hug, throwing his arms around Alfred's neck. The Karrian gladly returned the gesture. “I've been waiting a long time for this.”

Alfred took the time to wash Kost's face before he rejoined Bubbles, just so the girl wouldn't know he'd been crying. The pair played in the water until dinner time, and a further treat was given to celebrate settling into their new abode; a family night in front of the holo for a few cartoons before a welcome home spanking and an early bedtime. Kost was put to bed alone; Bubbles was allowed to sleep in the pool, much to the girl's explosive delight.
The Kyyreni boy woke up somewhere past midnight in an unfamiliar place; his dreaming mind had expected to wake into his old room, and it took a few seconds to shake off the disorientation. Turning on the bedside lamp gave him an amber glow by which to sweep the room and plot the key locations: the bathroom space, writing desk, Bubbles' hot water machine tucked next to a wardrobe, a little reading corner with their musical instruments leaning against the bookshelf, and his prayer corner. The boy found himself studying the home-made icon to his patron, and not for the first time wished there were some priest who could help him make sense of the world. Shaking off the doubts, he chose instead to take up his guitar, pressing it to the bare fur of his chest and heading downstairs into the silent, unlit house.
The pool glowed as he entered the conservatory. Soft, underwater lights around the bottom edge produced a faint halo that outlined the amphibian girl stretched out under the water. The Kyyreni boy sat down at the edge halfway along the pool, sitting with his back towards the sea, and watched her. A sharp, unpleasant thought, like a splinter in his mind, pushed its way up the back of his skull: could Bubbles drown? She was perfectly still, after all... but as if reading his thoughts the faintest of ripples danced across the pool's surface. She was still 'breathing' if that was the right term for whatever she did underwater. As he watched, Bubbles stirred and began to rise, her grinning face a gradient of greens, yellows and pale beige, all blue-shifted by the light below.
Kost made a rough bed for himself out of towels and lay down, reaching with a paw to cup under her chin. He felt the damp press of her fingers against his own neck; Bubbles' pulse was faster than normal, but she was having to swim to keep position. That, and she'd found herself in a personal paradise – a racing heart was to be expected.
The pair broke away. Kost dried his paw on the towel before settling into a sitting position, legs dipped into the water for Bubbles to cling to as he began to strum his guitar. His bedroom was closer to the pool than that of his parents, not that he cared much about being caught either way. He strummed the chords of an old folk song, a duet between a warrior and his love.
Without missing a beat, Bubbles began to softly sing the words of the lover's wife. “The gold you find would fix the roof o'er our heads. The silver would buy a fine meal. But if e'er you left me and never returned, 'tis a wound that no riches can heal. For you are my treasure, my one and true love; for you are all that I hold dear. I'll gladly be hungry or shivering cold, so long as I have you right here.”
Alfred and Tish found the pair together when they awoke next morning; Kost was stretched out on a bed of towels, sleeping with one paw in the water. They scolded the boy for sneaking out of his room and warned he'd be in for a hiding if he ever did it again, but they were smiling as they said it.", "pools_count": 1, "title": "Juvenalas Penitatas - Bubbles and Kost", "deleted": "f", "public": "t", "mimetype": "text/rtf", "pagecount": "1", "rating_id": "1", "rating_name": "Mature", "ratings": [ { "content_tag_id": "2", "name": "Nudity", "description": "Nonsexual nudity exposing breasts or genitals (must not show arousal)", "rating_id": "1" } ], "submission_type_id": "12", "type_name": "Writing - Document", "guest_block": "t", "friends_only": "f", "comments_count": "2", "views": "188" }