The Seaside Getaway

It's that time again, everyone!
Caz's actually got started with the next trip? Incredible!
Why couldn't she have had this much enthusiasm when she actually started the site?
Remember, Caz was a busy person then. She has more free time now.
Enough already! I want to know who won!
Patience is the way to go, Jenna.
Alex, we should totally go together on the next trip!
Unfortunately, that is purely up to the voters.
Oh yeah... *sigh* Note to self: Hold Caz hostage and rig next poll options with mostly Kraden pairings... oops, did I say that out loud?
No cookies for you, Jenna!
Rest assured, we won't let Jenna anywhere near the poll. And the winning pairing is Felix/Mia! That should make Softshippers happy.
 

Mia stood outside the bright blue house, ooh-ing and ahh-ing happily. Everything about it was blue. The walls were light blue. The roof was dark blue. Even the windowsills were blue. Mia clasped her hands to her chest and sighed happily as she imagined all the blue floors, blue walls, blue furniture, blue everything that was just waiting for her inside that house.

And she had rented this house with her very own money from the Rainbow Pride Travel Co. They were well renowned for their many colour themed houses. Yellow hadn't sounded particularly nice- what if it had puce?! And Green? Yuck. Blue was Mia's favourite colour so she jumped at the chance of staying at a blue themed house. Naturally, her companion hadn't had a say in choosing the house. Probably too scared of her to argue.

Mia smirked and turned around, watching the dark-haired Venus Adept trudge his way up the path dragging a bag behind him. Felix was being very quiet as usual. Mia shrugged and continued her way to the door. She had ways of making him talk, so it wasn't bothering her.

The reason Felix was quiet was that he was scared. Very scared.

According to Isaac, Mia was psychotically evil and liked to chase people with frying pans and assorted kitchen utensils.

Well, ok, he didn't say psychotically evil.

"A little deranged," Isaac had said. "Maybe somewhat on the dangerous side. Beware the frying pan of doom. And remember... she never sleeps."

Felix shook his head, scowling. Isaac was just being silly. Of course Mia slept. Everybody had to sleep. And frying pans? Mia used maces, not frying pans.

She didn't bring a mace, did she?

Nah. Of course not.

Mia had already gone inside and a series of delighted squeals came out the front door. Felix stepped inside and blanched. Everything really was blue!

A blue-tit in a blue cage hanging from the ceiling sang mournfully and pecked morosely at a bowl of seeds.

"I thought people kept budgies," Felix muttered as he closed the door.

"Awwwww!!!" Mia squealed from somewhere far away. "How cute!"

Curiosity killed the cat.

But Felix slung his bag on the stairs and went to see what Mia was squealing over anyway.

He found Mia standing in front of a basket, her back to him, making gushy sounds. A basket? And several bowls of dry food on the floor? Blue bowls naturally. And a blue litter tray. Fortunately, it had been cleaned out recently. Wait, litter tray?

"Uh..." Felix spoke up nervously. "What's... that you've got there?"

"KITTY!" Mia spun around and proudly presented a little Russian Blue kitten.

Felix went pale as he stared into the kitten's round gold eyes.

"Meow," The kitten batted at him with a paw.

"AAAAAH!!!" Felix screamed loudly and girlishly before fleeing out of the kitchen. The rapid stamping of his feet and the wild dragging of a bag up some stairs signalled that he had escaped upstairs to safety.

Mia blinked and hugged the distressed kitten. "There, there, kitty. It's not your fault. Felix's just really silly. I never knew he was scared of cats. How can he be scared of a super adorable fluffy wuffly iddle widdle baby kitten like you?"

Felix hid in a comfy, blue bed, cowering under the blue duvet, shaking in fright. There was a cat in this house. A cat! Ever since he got attacked by a fiendish and violent feline sent forth by denizens of Hades when he was little, he had been terrified of those demonic felines. How could anybody like them, even trust them, with those menacing eyes, those gleaming fangs, those claws!

He still hadn't forgotten that terrible, terrible day he nearly perished...

No, not the storm. The kitten. That one.

"One of Miss Agatha's cats had kittens," His mother smiled, holding a box in her arms. "But she has no room for them so she asked us to look after the kittens and help them find homes."

"You mean the Crazy Cat Lady?" Felix, aged all of five years, looked up with wide, owlish eyes.

"Felix!" His mother frowned.

"Kitty!" Jenna squealed, hopping around excitedly and pulling on her mother's dress. "Me wanna see!"

And so, their mother made the foolish mistake of leaving her two young children to play with the kittens in the box while she went to get some food for them. There were three little kittens in that box- one was white, one was ginger and white and the other was ginger. Jenna grabbed the ginger kitten out of the box and proceeded to hug it, provoking a squeak from the terrified kitten.

"Eeeee!" Jenna grinned. "It's soft! I wanna keep it forever!"

Felix carefully took the white kitten out of the box and put it on the floor. The kitten stared at him with wide, blue eyes. Felix reached out and stroked its head, provoking a purr. The kitten's tail twitched slightly and Felix looked at it, entranced by how it moved so swiftly. The kitten sat with its paws under its body and swished its tail back and forth.

As Jenna reduced the ginger kitten to within an inch of its life with her deadly hugs, Felix wondered what would happen if he pulled the kitten's tail. Did they like having their tails pulled? Would the tail grow even longer if he pulled it? Maybe he could make it have a tail the length of the river!

Entranced by the thought, Felix grabbed the tail and pulled sharply.

It didn't grow.

Instead, the kitten released a yowl and spun around, turning its gaze on Felix. Those serene blue eyes were now boiling pools of murder.

Felix screamed in terror as the kitten lunged at him and started scratching him while hissing and spitting. He barely managed to pry it off him before fleeing the room and slamming the door behind him. It didn't occur to him he'd left his little sister at the mercy of evil, demonic kittens. He just wanted to cry and tell his mommy the mean kitty tried to kill him.

Felix had never even gone near the Crazy Cat Lady's house again after that terrible experience and he had avoided cats like the plague. Fortunately, the Crazy Cat Lady died when a large, overweight tom decided to sleep on her face. Actually, he suspected it was murder, not an accident, but nobody had thought to put the cat in jail or anything. The cats had vanished when she died and Kraden moved into that cottage a year later to torture the unsuspecting children with his Alchemy lessons.

Still, Alchemy lessons were better than the glaring eyes of death shining out of the windows of that cottage.

"Felix?" Mia walked into the room and looked at the cowering lump in the bed. "Are you scared of cats?"

"Yes," Felix whimpered, sounding muffled. "Cats are evil!"

"Why?" Mia suddenly yanked the duvet off Felix, provoking a terrified yelp. She raised an eyebrow.

"Cats... are evil," Felix said again, turning his petrified chocolate eyes on her. "When I was little... a cat... tried... it tried... to kill me!"

"That's silly," Mia sat on the bed, grinning. "Cats don't kill people."

"Yes, they do," Felix said insistently. "There was this crazy cat lady in Vale, who once got murdered by a fat tomcat in her sleep! It suffocated her!"

"Sure..." Mia said slowly, not quite believing his tale. It was most likely that the cat had just wanted a nice cosy place to sleep and didn't realise that a nice, warm, human face was bad to sleep on.

"Can't sleep... cat will eat me..." Felix said slowly and quietly, his arms around his legs. He was shivering too.

"Oh, sheesh," Mia produced the kitten from her robes and plonked it down on the mattress. Felix froze in fear, staring transfixedly at the kitten.

"Meow?" The cute little Russian Blue tilted its head and stared curiously at Felix.

"T...take it... away..." Felix whispered hoarsely.

"The kitten is not going to hurt you!" Mia snapped. Despite trying to be nice and kind and gentle and whatnot, her patience had its limits. "Just stroke it. It won't go ballistic."

Felix gulped. Should he touch the demonic kitten and risk mauling or refuse and risk facing Mia's wrath?

Being clouted by a frying pan sounded painful.

What if she really did bring a mace?

An image rose in his mind, of Mia brandishing the mace at him and hissing "Touch the kitty or else."

Maybe he needed to see a shrink. This paranoia of his was getting to be a bit much.

It was Isaac's fault. He started it.

Felix gulped and reached out with a hand, his fingertips stretching ever closer to the tiny little ball of fluff.

Mia let out a quiet sigh of relief. Seemed like she didn't have to whack him with a frying pan until he obeyed her after all.

Felix gasped as his fingers touched the kitten's head. He paused with baited breath, waiting for the kitten to scratch him and unleash its wrath. However, it didn't. He nervously stroked it, and then amazingly (to Felix at any rate) the kitten started purring.

"See, Felix?" Mia grinned. "The kitten didn't kill you!"

"I guess," Felix withdrew his hand. "I still don't like cats much..."

"I see," Mia sighed. So it wasn't that simple. "But at least you're going to stop screaming like a girl when you see one, right?"

"I did not scream like a girl!" Felix went red.

"Did too," Mia giggled. "You hit an even higher pitch than Alex that time I kicked him in the crotch," Suddenly, she had a dreamy look on her face. "I'll never forget the look on his face as he curled up in pain."

"Eep," Felix muttered.

"I won't hurt you," Mia looked at him. "So long as you promise we're going to enjoy ourselves and we won't let cats get in the way."

"Mrow," The kitten looked up at her pitifully but Mia ignored it,

"Okay," Felix smiled faintly. "I promise."

"Great," Mia jumped off the bed. "Let's go check out the rest of the place."

Felix and Mia's exploration of the house revealed that just about everything was blue. Blue bathroom, blue living room, blue kitchen. There was even a room full of blue things like Smurfs. Felix was about to get tired of all this blue, but Mia positively loved it.

And then it was supper time, Mia cooking supper, and Felix sat at the blue table, feeling nervous. What kind of crazy dish was Mia going to whip up? Something blue?

"Here's the starter!" Mia plopped a plate in front of him. "Blue cheese and crackers!"

Felix grimaced to himself and picked up a cracker. At least the crackers weren't blue. But blue cheese? Why not Edam or Cheddar or Leicester or Gloucester or... he blinked and shook his head. Why was he suddenly rattling off a list of different types of cheese? At least the cheese didn't taste too bad.

Main course? Cordon bleu chicken of course. Well, not entirely blue, but Mia's reasoning was that bleu was French for blue so that made it okay.

And dessert was blueberry icecream. Felix wasn't happy about that, he preferred vanilla or chocolate or strawberry or praline or toffee or... ok, stop.

"That was a good meal, wasn't it?" Mia smiled at him as they left the kitchen.

"Yeah, that wasn't so bad," Felix said hesitantly. Well, ok, the chicken was nice. The cheese was okay. But the ice cream? Blueberry?! What was she thinking?

"You did well earlier," Mia said suddenly. "You faced up to your fears and even stroked the kitten. That was good... you're really brave." Impulsively, she kissed him on the cheek before flaring red in the face and scurrying away to a random room in the house.

Felix was also red in the face, silently touching the spot where she kissed him.

Suddenly, the kitten emerged and walked over Felix's foot, rubbing against his leg.

Felix involuntarily stiffened and looked down into the kitten's eyes. Suddenly, it retched and hacked up a furball. Felix grimaced and ran away, leaving the kitten with its mess.

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