The child nextdoor

chapter 22

Third pov

The three kids that had loomed over the younger kids snickered a little bit, the one boy that stood taller in front gripped on to autumns shirt, pulling her up to his face with a slight sneer.

" Looks like we got some fresh meat today boys!" His voice sounds like grinding metal. The two boys behind him giggled mischievously before crowding around the rest of the kids, blocking their chances of escaping.

" Uh! Uhh! Let go of me!" Autumn yelped out, kicking her legs around a little bit while the older boy chuckles evilly at her weak attempts to escape.

" And what if I don't? What are you guys going to do about it?"

In that moment autumn just stares up behind him, a look of fear painting on not only her face but the others as well, the main bully didn't seem to notice at first, but when he looked up at his companions is when he slowly realized he was missing something.

" What are you two gawking at?!" He barked at the two, only to look back behind him when they both pointed with shaky fingers. Only for him to drop autumn to the ground and back up towards his own buddies. There behind him stood a very pissed off papa dust, and ghost as well but the only one who could see him was autumn and Kathy surprisingly. Dust glared over at the bullies, while autumn signals her group of friends to hide behind dust, which they gladly did so.

Dust starred down at the three bullies in front of him with an angry glare, his hands were shoved in to his pockets while his Christmas like eyes gazed in to the lot of them. It was a few seconds before he finally scared the three of them off, after doing so he turned back to the other children, mostly checking on autumn before he turned to leave. Autumn gripped on to his hand, pulling him a bit before he could which made him grunt out a little bit in surprise-

" Papa dust-"

" ...papa?"

" Will you and papa ghost stay with us and play?"

" ghost? You mean papy?"

Dust points at said person, who happily drifted down to autumn, circling her to make sure she wasn't really all that injured. Kathy, who was hidden behind her sister, rushed over by autumns side, putting her hand out to his own, which surprised him a little bit. " Y...YOU CAN SEE ME AS WELL-"

A nod was his reply, making ghost smile brightly before he floated over to his brother, whispering something first before floating back around Kathy a bit. Dust rolled his eyes, looking down at the ground in thought for a bit before moving over to where autumn sat originally while they were playing their restaurant game.

" dont expect me to stay too long....as soon as your teacher calls you back inside I'm headin out"

With an excited giggle autumn and Kathy joined hands together, rushing over behind their make shift counter, with ghost following behind them, Olivia, Avery and Charlie all sat by dust, asking him a whole bunch of questions while he sat there with his chin on one of his hands, a bored expression planted on his face while he answered each question slowly.

" Oh...papa dust..."

He peered over at autumn with that same bored expression. " what?"

" How come none of the others like you and papa ghost?"

" heh, cuz I have a higher lv then I do..."

This made Charlie and Olivia a bit nervous, the others weren't exactly sure what that meant.

" Eh, where I was from no body really cares who or what you were, it was tough. A kill or be killed world, and because I'm a small monster, people though I was an easy target, which is why I have such a high lv"

" Oh...I'm sorry you had to go through that mister dust, my mamas coworkers had that same type of thing too..." Charlie chimed while autumn placed a piece of bark in front of them, looking at dust with a sad expression. " Papa dust, how come only Kathy and I can see papa ghost?"

" Mm, I can see him, and so can a few others, all depends on the person really"  this made autumn get a little more excited, others can see  him as well?!

" Oh! Do you know them!"

" yep, maybe one day you'll meet the too-"

" Oh oh do they know!-"

" CHILDREN! IT'S TIME TO COME BACK INSIDE!" miss amani's voice echoed from the classrooms back door, while the children turned their heads towards her, dust took this chance to blip out before anything else happened, he watches from the treelines that faced the school, making sure they all made it back inside safely.

" YOU'RE GETTING ATTACHED TO HER BROTHER"

silence was the reply.

" IT'S ALRIGHT, GETTING QUITE ATTACHED TO HER AS WELL, BUT LET'S NOT LET NIGHTMARE AND THE OTHERS FIND OUT"

Which was a little too late for that, during that time cross had been watching him play with said children, he had been watching dust ever since he had blipped back from the last time he went on patrol to check in with the lodge skeletons. He didn't really care about it at first, but once he mentioned to ghost about a young child joining the family, he became a little more intrigued.

" So this little rumor is true?" Cross spoke to himself. With that he disappeared before anyone could see him, heading straight for nightmare to give him his report.