"Reports of strange new flora and fauna continue to roll in-"
Static crackled as the channel changed but the voice did not, gamely continuing on another topic with high winds in the background.
"-and you heard this singing off the port bow? Was it an alto or a sopr-"
"-Missus Mary's Meddlin' Mess cookies are sure to ward off all manner of brownies, pixies, hide-behinds, and-"
"- so that's all from your friendly, live reporter Azira Fail, handing it off to, you guessed it, the lovely Azira Fail! Thank you, Azira, as I was saying -"
Rather than yet another change in channels, the reporter was cut off this time by a cry of rage. The radio blissfully carried on in the background, unaware and thus unthreatened by the explosion of fury taking place before it.
"Blasphemy!" Preston declared, "All of the late night radio dramas have been replaced by this infernal creature! How will we digest in peace? She has NO sense of DRAMA!"
Picking up his fork and scratching his cheek with it thoughtfully, Max pointed abruptly upward as if realizing something. "Oh, that's right!" His finger fell and expression went flat as he informed the other camper, "No one cares."
"I, for one, appreciate the amount of lore she's willing to share with us," Nerris replied absently, focused on scribbling notes in her leather bound journal. "She's not even charging for it!"
"Yeah, whatever," Max said dismissively, gaze drifting reluctantly to David. He still needed to talk with him, but the counselor was even now trying to get Space Kid to cough up the opal pendant he'd found and swallowed - or Nurf had made him swallow once he realized it gave the holder the ability to levitate. Space Kid ended up both ecstatic and twelve feet off the ground.
Whether Nurf was trying to be kind or cruel was equally up in the air, as he'd given Space Kid a thumbs up and gone back inside for dinner.
"I can make it!" Space Kid was arguing, even as Gwen agitatedly gripped the string tied around his ankle with both hands. "Just let me go!"
"Don't you want some delicious medicine first?" David asked with a tinge of desperation, still holding out the spoon full of syrup of ipecac.
"You know your 'space suit' is cardboard, Space Kid!" Gwen tugged the string, making the child bounce against the ceiling to no ill effect. "You will die before you get to the moon."
"Aim for the moon," Space Kid replied with a serious expression, "and you will always land among the stars."
"Dead," Gwen emphasized, not noticing David's chagrin slide off his face to leave something a tad less patient in its place at the reminder.
"Harrison!" he called sharply, and the magician was at their side in a poof of glitter that had them all coughing.
Mysteriously unaffected by the cloud, Nerris hummed to herself pensively as she shut her journal, "I'm going to make people pay out the nose for a guidebook."
"And that's why," Harrison coughed, "David always calls me."
A roll of her brown eyes, "I was talking to Max, Harrison."
Max blinked out of his scheming to get David alone after dinner with a bemused blankness. "What?"
Harrison gestured wordlessly at Max's continued confusion, in part because he was still coughing up glitter.
"Whatever," sniffed Nerris, hopping to her feet and heading to another table. "I'm sure Erid will appreciate my brilliance."
As the glitter settled, David found his voice once more, "Harrison." He held up a finger for a moment and spat red sparkles into a napkin before continuing, "Curse Space Kid to throw up the pendant."
"I don't know specifically how to make people throw up," Harrison started hesitantly, but at the tight smile on David's face, backtracked. "Yep, yes, I can do it. He will also possibly manifest at least three doves somewhere in the vicinity of his mouth but nothing maiming."
"Hear that, Space Kid?" Gwen asked, catching on to David's ploy. Or what she thought was David's ploy. Honestly, she wasn't sure if he was just at the end of his rope or actually being slightly manipulative. "You're giving it up either way. Why not without doves in your mouth?"
Space Kid narrowed his eyes at Harrison, hissing, "You're a traitor to your country."
This was met with a shrug, "I am not technically a citizen."
At this unarguable fact, he scrunched his nose behind the plastic of his helmet and sighed, "I'll eat the ipecac."
"Good kid!" David cheered as Gwen reeled the kid down for easy access.
Once the pendant was safely removed from Space Kid's body and crushed to dust in the bare hands of a certain smiling camp counselor, they moved on to the night's surprise.
"Since this is our last night together -"
"Apparently," Gwen muttered under her breath, still not fully adjusted to time re-establishing itself.
" - Gwen and I thought we should bring out the ice cream and make a real night of it!" David concluded with a cheeriness that Max, for one, found suspicious.
Now that he was paying attention again.
David should be, at the very least, jittery like the last time he thought the threat to the camp had ended. Or crying because the kids were going home tomorrow.
Tomorrow.
Right, Max was on a time limit.
He kept a weather eye on David, looking for chinks in the facade as the counselors distributed ice cream. Refusing his own with only a little reluctance, he finally found a moment to pounce as the other campers were distracted by dessert.
"David," he tugged the man's sleeve where he was leaning against the wall. When David sent him a querying look, Max continued, "I have to tell you something." At the counselor's attempt to say something ridiculous about going ahead right here or whatever, Max interjected, "Outside."
As Max led him out of the dining hall, David's brow creased and his smile dropped.
"Max," he began carefully, "is everything okay?"
Shoving his hands into his pockets, Max wobbled his head from side to side, "So-so. But I can fix it. I have a plan."
A wince, and David crouched to Max's level, "I didn't really like your last few plans."
"They did work," Max pointed out, but the counselor's ongoing grimace prompted him to move on. "Anyway, I don't throw myself into a volcano in this one and the only fucked up killer I talk to is you."
"Looking up already," David conceded, the killer comment evidently bouncing off his newly reformed sense of self or whatever. There wasn't time to dissect what was going through David's head at the moment. Max had other things to tell him.
A deep breath preceded Max's dive directly into, "So, I've been gathering information from your stories and from Gwen, and I could basically steal your entire identity at this point." Ignoring other people's alarm came easily to Max and he put it into practice as David's eyes went wide. "Your passwords are kindergarten easy, too, by the way. Stop losing your phone. Physically holding onto it is literally your only defense."
Not taking his shocked gaze from Max, David patted the pocket his phone was- had been in.
"Yeah," Max said, handing it over.
"Thank you," David replied numbly. He knew Max had had it multiple times before, but he hadn't known Max had logged into anything. He had a Tinder account on there! Not that it was seeing much use, lately.
Still, it was the principle of the thing.
"So, remember when you were all like, 'Hey, Max, are your parents abusive shitholes?'"
All thought of the phone and its various apps were wiped from David's mind as his gaze darted back to Max with a laser focus. "Do they-"
The sudden tense, furious cant to David's voice had Max throwing his hands up as if to wave the words out of the air, "They're not! They're not- not physically abusive." His hands dropped, the energy leaving his words, "They don't love me."
It was said so bluntly, and Max had repeated similar sentiments so often... Maybe David couldn't comprehend how anyone could ignore a child like Max, but that didn't mean it wasn't happening.
It sounded true.
And David had spent enough time not listening to Max.
"...Max, I-"
"They've told me," Max interrupted. "And they aren't brain-damaged like you, so of course, they can't stand me. I was, originally, going to blackmail my parents and go behind your back so that I could get some sort of temporary ward deal going and then blackmail you into ignoring me, but then you had to go and be all- all weird and full of feelings and even I can't just crush the kind of mind-blowing naivete it takes to..." He lost momentum, looking down at his feet and returning his hands to his pockets. Quickly, Max shook it off, hitting David with a determined squint, "So I made a different plan. I'm adaptable like that." He set his feet and squared his shoulders, as if preparing for a fight. "David Adelard, you are going to adopt me."
When David continued to stare at him in silence, Max fidgeted and pulled rolled up papers from the front of his hoody.
"I've already filled out all your information, from, you know, my original plan, and I have enough dirt on my parents that they'll have to go along with it, and the judge will agree this time because it's adoption instead of emancipation and you're in good with all the law enforcement and I'm practically raising myself, anyway, so it's not like you'll have anything to do, really, but if- if you really don't want to..." He was still holding out the papers, and his hand drooped slightly before he set his jaw and shoved the papers into David's hands, "Well, then too bad because I can get you arrested seven ways to Sunday!"
As Max made a last grab for dignity, David tried to force down the emotions this revelation had brought about. That Max preferred someone he termed a 'fucked up killer' over his parents. That he'd specified physical abuse. That they'd said... Some of the cutting anger swirling in his chest must have sliced through to his expression, because Max very abruptly made a grab for the papers.
"You know what?" He was talking a mile a minute. "I don't know what the hell I was thinking, anyway- who'd want you as a guardian? I mean, camp songs every night? Fucking kill me now. I'd be better off running away-"
"Max," David tightened his hold on the papers before they could be taken from his very white-knuckled grip, his heart squeezing similarly at the lost look Max sent his way. "I'm definitely adopting you."
"Oh." Max released the papers, visibly torn between gleeful relief and hurt confusion at the tone in which that message was delivered. "You don't seem... thrilled about it."
"No, I'm-" David took in Max's growing skepticism and sighed, forcibly pushing some of the tension from his frame, "Max, I think you're an incredible child and I'd- I'd love to do this. I am doing this."
Arms crossed defensively over his chest, Max prompted, "But...?"
"But... I'd also like to keep my death toll down and it might be for the best if I never meet your parents privately," David admitted. He'd been practically trained to tell Max the truth at this point. It seemed like it would always out in the end. He was never made to keep a secret in the first place. That he had for so long was a testament to his desire to continue protecting the campers.
Of course, saying that out loud had probably been a mistake. Now that he was thinking more deeply on it.
Yes, definitely a mistake to imply murderous feelings towards a camper's parents directly to said camper. If Gwen had been eavesdropping on the conversation, she might have walloped him for that.
And he'd rationalized it to himself like a pro.
Aw, man. David was leaning on a ten year old.
"You're... mad at them," Max said quietly, searching David's eyes for a hint of a lie and his tone implying a question more than a statement.
A cold laugh escaped David before he could stop it, and he reached out to run a hand over Max's ever tangled hair to soften the involuntary reaction. "Yes," he said aloud, keeping the correction of furious to himself.
"You believe me this time," Max pressed, more ardently. Daniel was clearly going to be a mark on his permanent record.
David pulled the unresisting child into a hug, "Yes, Max, I believe you."
A beat passed and Max relaxed into the hold.
"Guess I can throw out those pictures of you sucking your thumb in your sleep."
Rolling his eyes upward for patience, David replied in a strained voice, "Please do."
Max was just considering returning the hug when a shout broke the tranquility of the moment.
Berstuk, covered in flaking metallic paint, stumbled bewilderedly onto the scene with wild eyes and arms held stiffly out from his sides. When he could finally bring himself to speak, however, his demand was clear, concise, and to the point.
"What the fuck happened to me?"
.
Ushered into the kitchen where he was wrapped in a towel and had a mug of hot chocolate pressed into his hands, Berstuk wasn't entirely sure when he'd lost control of the situation. Maybe it was somewhere around the kid rolling his eyes and declaring Berstuk "David's problem." Maybe it was when David had taken that cue to start talking about how confused Berstuk must be and what a terrible host he was at rapidfire pace.
Blowing automatically on his cocoa, Berstuk decided it was the moment David had efficiently and reflexively gutted the humanoid tree-creature that had tried to drag Max into the forest.
It had had... not exactly tree-like innards.
And judging by the vibrant blue slime that still stained his shirt, David's hands, and was currently being rinsed out of Max's hair, it hadn't had humanoid innards, either.
"Is it too cold?" David was asking, Max's head under the faucet to Berstuk's left.
"It's fine." Max's voice was muffled but the irritation came through clear. "Is the soap working yet?"
"Yep," David replied, popping the p.
The door to the dining hall burst open on the heels of Gwen's kick.
"-to steal the fucking kids again," she was complaining as she ushered in the campers with the Quartermaster's half-hearted assistance. Various neon shades were splattered across her clothes and the baseball bat she had propped up over one shoulder, but she only stopped to wipe slime from her face with a grimace once the kids were in and the doors closed.
None of the children appeared to be limping or wounded, though several had neon splashes of their own. David caught Gwen's eye, releasing Max and only flinching a little when the kid shook his hair out with a wet splash before heading towards the nearest hand towel. "Is everyone okay?"
"Yeah, but a bunch of these freaking creatures have a taste for kids," Gwen growled, gesturing at the door with her technicolor bat.
"And fair maidens," Space Kid piped in, helmet off for once as it was coated in a yellow-green goo that had thickened and solidified over the majority of the plastic.
"Yes, thank you again, Space Kid," Gwen replied, slightly mollified as she ruffled the boy's hair.
A general murmur of assent came from the assembled children. They were all rather scuffed up, but it appeared the shock of the assault had bounced off their characteristic resilience with all the effect of David's camp songs on their attitude.
In other words: none.
Unfortunately this left questions still unanswered, and David opened his mouth to ask exactly what happened only to be beaten to the punch.
Still wrapped in a towel decorated with small pine trees and hearts, Berstuk managed a quiet, "What the fuck?"
"This centaur tried to drag Gwen off once she got done pummelling the pixies and we all beat his ass, but Space Kid was beast," Erid explained with relish, flipping stained hair behind her shoulder as she recalled the fight. "Plus, we all got free hair dye out of it."
"You're washing that out," Gwen demanded, pointing at her as if to push the idea home. In an instant, her finger swept across the campers as a whole, "All of you. It's blood. You are not keeping it on you!"
Dolph's hands flew up to his newly yellow hair protectively.
"But Gwen, Erid says it's too cool to be infectious!" Nikki whined at his side, war paint smeared over her cheeks and brow in a rainbow of potential contamination. She got a nod of approval from the taller girl that made her bounce happily on her toes as Neil - mostly uncolored by their near death experience - groaned and caught her by the strap of her overalls.
He hauled her in close so she could take notice of his scowl without any distractions. His tone was measured and clipped, "It's a biohazard, Nikki."
"You're a biohazard, Neil!" she shot back, slipping free of his grip and grabbing Dolph as she ran for the door. "Freedom of self-expression is a first amendment right!"
"It is not!" Neil shouted after her, "Not really!"
"Where did she even pick up that-?" Gwen's eyes landed on an unconcerned Max, still scrubbing roughly at his hair with the hand towel David had handed him and dropped her face into her hands. "Of course."
It only took an hour for the rebellion to coalesce in the center of the grounds, mostly having been herded there by the appearance of David or an angry folkloric creature - both following the group for very different reasons. Persuaded to draw protest signs for the revolution, Dolph sat atop Nurf's shoulders sporting a sign proclaiming the necessity of rights for 'colored people' as Nikki and a few conscripted general campers marched around him with signs of their own and a disconcerting, nonsensical chant.
"I feel like it would send the wrong message if we told them to stop, now," David gestured at the signs, knowing Gwen would intuit his meaning. The counselors stood at its edge with the campers that had been convinced to shower, watching the movement idly now that they were stuck in one spot. David was, after all, within grabbing distance even if his arms were crossed, motionless, over his chest.
"Their parents will be here any minute," Gwen reminded him. Her mouth snapped shut and she paused as her own words registered. "Why is it morning?"
"Time is still settling," Harrison replied from where he was carefully balancing the last cards of his tower a safe distance from the protest. A moment later, Nerris triumphantly shouted from around the corner of the hall and the card tower collapsed. "Nerris!" he exclaimed, clutching his hat in distress. "I was almost finished!"
"Too slow!" she called back with an edge of a tease.
An unintelligible noise of frustration escaped the self-proclaimed illusionist as he rounded the corner, followed shortly by an eep from his friendly nemesis. Laughing nervously, Nerris ran past the counselors with Harrison in hot pursuit moments later.
They exchanged a look that Gwen ended with a whined, "I hate Harrison problems."
"Color rights!" Nikki shouted, raising her sign high as Nurf and Dolph echoed her cry.
"But that is still so weird," Gwen ran a hand over her face. Blowing out a breath, she decided, "Okay, I'll go chase down Harrison so he doesn't vanish Nerris if you separate the rebels from their warpaint before the parents get here."
"Gwen," David turned to her with a serious expression, "as a white man, I'm not sure I have the right to-"
"They are talking about colored slime, David!" Man, it was easy to forget David was more than a happy fool when he blinked at her like that. And when she still, almost unwillingly, trusted him. Especially after the last few days. "And unless you want our clients to think we allow their kids to smear unknown shit all over themselves on a regular basis, you will get your ass in gear now!"
Well, she had a point. Though these were extenuating circumstances David was sure most of the clients would understand. The phenomenon was global and they'd surely encountered their own fantastical creatures in the last day or so.
Hostile fantastical creatures, at that. It seemed most of the kind and neutral beings of legend didn't so actively seek out human settlements. Except for those like the tooth fairies that had visited Max with an apparent backlog of coins that had left him wide-eyed and quiet while David was chasing down the burgeoning rebellion.
"I guess I can't tell kids they don't exist anymore," he'd murmured to Neil, turning over a quarter between his fingers with an unreadable expression.
"You're a kid, dude," Neil had replied, the hand he put on Max's shoulder taking any unintended bite out of the words.
"Yeah." As he spoke, Max had tossed the coin up and grabbed it out of the air like punctuation. "I guess I am."
After that, they'd spent their time exchanging contact information and rifling through the counselor's cabin for Nikki's. It wasn't like anyone was paying them mind beyond making sure they didn't leave the grounds and get abducted - not with children running screaming down the paths to the forest striped with all the colors of the rainbow.
Of course, now that the colorful children were somewhat contained, Max caught David looking for him as the tired counselor plucked a few rebels at a time from the edges of their protective herd and dumped them into the kiddie pool of water and soap the Quartermaster had set up.
Or Max assumed that David's searching glances at the clean children meant he was looking for him. They might have sort of finished their conversation, but Max knew David had to worry about him. He- felt strongly for Max, after all.
Even as a sort of embarrassed warmth curled in his chest, Max found himself mentally tripping on the exact word, now that time and distance and settled themselves between him and David's confession.
For the first time in a long time, he had a chance. Hope.
A hope he tentatively allowed to grow as David's gaze met his and the man smiled, weary eyes lighting up and a bit of tension leaving him as he returned to his task, reassured Max was still there and in one piece.
Reality was still Max's bread and butter, however, and he shoved his hands mulishly in his pockets as he came to terms with the fact that he'd need to face his parents again.
It'd be the second time he'd force the issue with them, and he hadn't enjoyed the grounding that had followed the first time. For once, they'd paid attention to him, but only to enforce the punishment for finally 'going too far' in his attempts to embarrass them.
Not that he had really had friends to be kept away from or hobbies to stop him doing. Just TV and havoc. Still, Max had mostly spent the time drumming his heels against the wall in a variety of annoying patterns until his mother had given up and cut the time short.
It was the principle of the thing.
And maybe... This time, he'd see real hurt cross their faces instead of the quiet twinge, easily tucked away, of pain caused by a stranger. Of a blow to the pride more than the heart. He'd hoped, back then, that actually going to a judge, trying to push through his own emancipation would do something. That they'd... notice. Change.
Shaking his head, Max reminded himself that he didn't want that this time.
Because this time, Max was going to have a family, whether they shaped up or not.
After all, it wouldn't be them.
Fisting his hands in the depths of his hoody pocket, Max stood stiffly, eyes turned to the front gate.
He was going to win.
...
(Photo sourced from https://unsplash.com/@golfarisa)