Game time

Violet moved through the upstairs landing towards Brenda’s room, her body becoming more translucent until it was difficult to see where she was. Before fully entering, she pushed her face through the wall to check on the room.

With everything clear, she moved into the room, slowly drawing closer to the bed. She knelt beside Brenda. “Hey, I finally got to talk to John. I’m feeling so overwhelmingly happy, and maybe one day I’ll get to introduce myself to you too… I’m scared, I never thought I’d talk to either of you, so to me what I’ve done while the two of you were sleeping was just harmless fun, no one got hurt and I was able to be close to you both. I think I need to keep what I’ve done to myself for now, but I can’t lie to him forever… Even more worryingly, though, John is part of the Abyss… he’s such a sweet and gentle boy, I don’t want him to be frightened by any dangers that are still out there.”

The spectre sighed gently and reached towards Brenda, pushing the MILFs hair out of her face before pulling the blanket up and tucking her in more. “I promise I’ll do everything I can to keep him safe, I’d even give my life… if I had one.” She chuckled quietly to herself, before leaning over Brenda and kissing her forehead. “Night, beautiful.”

Violet stood, grabbing Brenda’s phone before moving to the door. She gently opened it just enough to fit the phone through the gap before passing through the door. Quietly she shut the door behind her and stood, pressing her back against it. She closed her eyes and let out a long deep breath.

Her eyes shot back open. ’Oh, that’s an amazing idea!’ she thought, heading downstairs.

“Do you think my mom woke up? And if she did, do you think Violet is waiting for her to fall back asleep again, or do you think she got caught?” John asked Dahlia.

The faerie shrugged. “If she was caught, I think you’d have heard a shriek by now. Want me to go look?”

John shook his head. “No, thank you, but I should go.”

He stood and headed to the door, opening it to find Violet approaching with his mother’s phone in one hand and something hidden behind her back in the other. Unfortunately for Violet, her efforts were in vain as John was able to see the bright colours and recognised the game box he’d customised when he was younger. He cocked his head as he looked from her face to the box, but she didn’t seem to notice what he was doing.

“Were you coming to check on me because you were worried? Aw, you’re such a sweetheart. But don’t worry, I didn’t wake Brenda up, and the reason I took a little while was that I had a great idea about how we could turn our twenty-one question thing into an actual fun game.” Violet beamed at John. She gently pushed him back into his bedroom as she entered.

John moved backwards before going around the opaque ghost girl, quietly closing the door. Violet smiled at him as she twisted, obviously trying to keep her back obfuscated in order to keep the object hidden. ’I guess it’s supposed to be a surprise. I am curious what she might have planned. I don’t exactly have room to play twister in here,’ he thought.

“Now now, I’ll let you in on that little secret once you explain everything with the phone to Dahlia,” Violet teased, holding out Brenda’s phone.

John took the phone from Violet and quickly set everything up, ensuring that the connection was hidden if Brenda ever looked through her settings. Luckily he and his mother had an unlimited data plan where hot-spotting was included.

After the phone was taken care of, he handed it to Dahlia, who, though obviously still trying to grasp how technology worked, still happily flicked through the device. “And you are giving me this? What would you like in return?” she asked.

John handed Brenda’s phone to Violet who exited the room. John let out a chuckle. “Nothing. Well, nothing other than the updates I mentioned about Mom coming and going to the house when we ask. Feel free to play with the phone and figure out how it works.”

Dahlia smiled, hugging the device to her chest. In her hands it looked significantly larger, more like a small tablet than a mobile phone, which made John chuckle. “It seems more difficult than the internet, but I will try to master it. While on the internet I found it quite interesting looking at how your world views the fae. It seems if they exist here, they stay hidden and humans think we are either very cutesy or very malevolent.”

Violet returned in time to hear half of what Dahlia was saying and nodded. “There are humans here without magic, so there are organisations that keep non-magical humans separated from the magical world. It’s why you will need to stay hidden. There are obviously places you don’t need to hide, but for the most part, you’ll need to stay hidden, and I know that sucks a lot, but John won’t let you go stir crazy.”

John was taken aback by Violet’s gentle reassurance as well as her assertiveness. Violet smiled at him as she faded into full opacity once again.

“Well, since it seems like Dahlia is already up to speed on the spy mission, I guess we can move on to the game? Unless there’s anything else?” she asked, looking between them.

“That’s everything, I think. I don’t know how you expect us to play twister or how that comes into asking questions, though,” he replied.

The ghost looked shocked. “What? How did you? But… I kept it hidden!” she quietly complained.

“Being mostly see-through with a very bright coloured box in your hand makes it pretty easy to figure out what it is.” He chuckled before turning to Dahlia. “I don’t know if you’d want to join or if you’d prefer to go back to bed, but we’re supposed to be playing a game to ask each other things because I have quite a few questions for Violet that I’d like to ask. There are some questions I have for you too, but if you’re tired, they can wait until tomorrow.”

“Aw, come on, she has to play, it’ll be way more fun. Plus, I’m sure she can ask both of us some questions. That was the entire point in waiting until we got home,” Violet whined.

“Well, we can’t exactly **** her, can we? And it is rather late,” John pointed out.

“I’d like to be involved, if it’s okay with the both of you,” Dahlia interrupted.

Violet beamed at the faerie and silently clapped, before pulling out a box from under John’s pillow. “Okay, so the idea I had… Twister. Hear me out, we could do this one of two ways: first, we could actually play Twister and make some system for asking questions as we play. What do you think?”

John nodded. “Well, like I said, we don’t really have room for actually playing Twister, plus we need to keep the noise down. I’m going to guess you thought we could use the spinner like spin the bottle or something?”

Violet smiled. “I did. So I was thinking we’d sit on the bed or floor and go around in a circle spinning the Twister thing. Whatever colour you get is who you ask a question to. Now, I know what you’re about to say, ‘what if we land on ourselves or on the fourth colour?’ Well, I thought of that too. Landing on your own colour means you skip a turn, while landing on the fourth colour means that you ask a question that everyone has to answer. That all sound good? And easy enough to follow?”

John and Dahlia nodded. Violet quickly pulled out the spinner, sat on the bed and placed it down, looking at the other two expectantly.

“Come on,” she coaxed, which prompted the two to climb onto the bed too. John sat at the head of the bed, while Dahlia sat on the edge. “Okay, so John will be green because that’s his favourite colour, do you have any preference? Or is it okay for me to take blue?” she asked, looking at Dahlia.

Dahlia looked down at the cardboard square. “There’s no purple, and John has green, so I’d pick yellow, if that’s alright?”

Violet smiled and nodded. “Good, so John is green, Dahlia’s yellow, I’m blue and red is everyone. John has the most questions so I think he should go first.”

Dahlia nodded in agreement and both girls looked at him, waiting. John leaned forwards and flicked the hand of the spinner, sending it around with a considerable amount of speed. The spinner began to slow down, though not quickly enough as it landed a hair over onto left foot green.

“Well, I started out strong…” John sighed.

“You’ll get it next time,” Violet encouraged. “Dahlia, your turn, just do what John did.”

Dahlia nodded and leaned over the spinner, mimicking John. The hand flew around the board before landing on right hand blue.

“Right, just ask me a question, it can be anything,” Violet encouraged.

Dahlia thought for a while, humming while tapping her finger on her cheek. “Okay, I think I have one. It seems that John wasn’t aware of you, but the house is saturated with your energy, maybe even more so than John’s or his mother's. Why is that?”

Violet nodded and hummed. “Well, first I’ll explain how I ended up here. I was originally tied to a safe house. It was empty and derelict; the only people I ever saw were either kids or people up to no good. That changed when builders came. Apparently, someone had bought the place and began renovating. The place was rented out to a few people but none of them stayed long. That was until roughly twelve years ago when Brenda and John moved into the house. They stayed for much longer than the others had and I grew attached to them. Luckily, I managed to follow them and ended up here. The thing is that even though I’ve lived with them for over a decade, John has only just become part of the Abyss, and like I said earlier, we can’t show ourselves to non-magical humans, so I wasn’t ever able to actually introduce myself.”

She cleared her throat and looked back up at the others. “Uhm, so yeah, I’ve been here all the time, just was never able to show myself. Sorry, I might have included way more than necessary there. Anyway, it’s my turn.”

She quickly leaned forward, spinning the hand around. It slowed and stopped at right foot red.

“Oh, it’s an everyone question, hmm… I wasn’t really thinking of questions for everyone. I guess we’ve kinda already had a free everyone question, we all know John’s favourite colour is green, mine is blue, and Dahlia’s is purple… Oh, what about favourite hobby or pastime? John’s was a tie between video games, drawing and writing, and… something a little naughtier, but that might have changed over the last week; he’s spent most of his time away from home.” Violet rambled.

Violet completely and accurately answering for him made John slightly uncomfortable, like he was in the room with his stalker.

Violet spoke again, “I asked so I guess it’s only fair I answer first. I really like spending time with John and Brenda. When I’m with John we’re playing video games or watching youtube stuff. I really love what John makes when he’s in a creative mood, but I do have to say it’s only really fun to check in on him periodically to see how he’s going when he’s focused like that.

“Brenda and I always have fun watching cooking shows or reality TV. John’s not really into that but I don’t want her to sit and watch that stuff alone so we have nice girls’ nights. I think my favourites are either one of the Gordon Ramsey shows or the Great British Bake-Off. We also all have movie nights sometimes, they’d take turns choosing movies to watch and we’d all watch on the couch.

“When John and Brenda are out, I usually borrow one of their PCs. I’ll often watch some youtube stuff, or one of my other favourite things to do is to troll people on paranormal subreddits. It entertains me so much that I’m arguing about how ghosts don’t exist and they try to show me all this proof; I don’t think a single one of them has ever sent me a legitimate ghost yet. That’s about it, really… John, your turn.”

The uncomfortable feeling John had slowly softened as Violet talked until he couldn’t help but feel for her. He nodded at the spectre. “Right, well, you basically hit the nail on the head for me. I guess magic could now count as a hobby? And I love being with Ellie, and I’ve been a hell of a lot more sociable lately, and even though it’s a little uncomfortable, it’s still nice to meet new people… yeah, that’s it, I guess. Dahlia?”

“Well, I like not being a prisoner. one of my favourite things is to stretch my wings and go flying, I like to feel the wind through my petals,” she said, reaching her hand up and stroking the pink petal-like hair on her head. “My ears and antennae are a little sensitive too so it feels quite nice on those as well. I wasn’t really much of a reader but I liked spending time with Dewdrop in her library, I liked listening to her reading out loud. I’ve never been really interested in history or real stuff, and I didn’t like the romance books Dewdrop had either. I always preferred the stories of adventure or exploration. I think that’s about it?”

“That’s pretty cool. I bet flying is super freeing,” John commented.

Violet nodded. “Oh, John you should get her some audiobooks. She’d be able to listen to what we have available and you definitely have a bunch of tokens for free books you could use. Later, though, it’s your turn again.”

John made a note on his phone to get Dahlia a set of headphones and some audiobooks before he reached and flicked the hand of the spinner again. It whirled around before slowing and stopping on left hand blue.

John looked at Violet, thinking of what question to ask. “What is the story about the pendant? Why was Moira interested in it?”

“Well, you really know how to choose questions…” She let out a deep breath. “There’s not really a way to go about this in a linear way that doesn’t provoke more questions, so just give me a chance to get to it… So when you become part of the Order and start your journey towards becoming a knight, you have to be a squire, which is essentially someone in training.

“The shield provides a small amount of protection, but it carries symbolism, it tells others that you’re no longer a squire and have earned your place in the Order… Earning it is only one way to be given one, though.” Violet frowned and looked down at the spinner.

After a moment she took a breath and began again, “Higher ranking knights can sometimes pass their shield to someone else, but only after giving their lives in the act of service… Sir Walter Harrington was my mentor, we were really close. Platonically, of course, he was old enough to be my grandpa. I was a late bloomer and it was even more dangerous back then than it is now. He saved me and gave me somewhere to learn to use my powers, and yes, that means I was an Order squire.

“Anyway, it was almost a year after he’d passed before I used the shield to lie my way onto an Order ship coming to America. I spent some time with the knights searching for the ones responsible for Walter’s ****, but my memories start to get fuzzy; I’m pretty sure I got caught by his killers and that’s how I ended up like this. Also, yes I said I came to America, I was a squire under the Shield Warden but I only saw her a handful of times. Our garrison was in York and the Order's main base was in the south of England.” There was silence for a few seconds at which Violet turned to Dahlia. “So, looks like it’s your turn.”

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