Dabble 08: Choosing a Home

“Temple, palace, castle, mansion,” Zen listed aloud, turning page after page while his eyes scanned over every word and image until something satisfied him. “No, that's no good. No, too common. No… geeze.” He closed the book and leaned back against his chair, sighing quietly to himself, and squeezing the space between his eyes.

“No luck either?” Dria asked, coming over from one of the bookshelves with a book on domestic living, and sat down. She brushed her hair back and stretched, leaning on her hand as she slouched forward. “Finding a living space big enough is a little harder than I thought.”

“What are you saying!” Their sister Natha screamed, riding down the banister from the second-floor bookshelves. “This library is huge and there's gotta be a home to call home. Come on, keep looking!” She flipped through a large chunk of pages rapidly, her eyes skimming briefly over every few images she could easily make out just to seem fancy.

“Even if you say that,” Zen answered as he leaned forward “To find a place for each of us that’s to our liking, that's 10 opinions put into one place. We can't just find one that easily. Money may not be an issue, but we'll be living in the real world. I don’t want to go with Zenith's idea of living in some isolated dimension. I like fresh air, I like nature, and I like being somewhat exposed, pentagon or not. And hiding underground I refuse to do.”

“It's been several months,” the purple phox interjected “since we've heard any movement from those three. And in all honesty, we don’t need to live anywhere Zen. We have our orbs as our sanctuary, so it's not a big deal.”

“It is to me,” Zen said, looking to Dria with her brown eyes vaguely showing interest in the book on the table. “I'm strong enough to where I don’t need to hide. I want to be together with my family and exposed to something simple. Magic is great but being someplace simpler and more relaxing would be a bonus.”

“As you wish,” Dria responded as she closed her eyes, leaning back in her chair. Zen could tell she enjoyed the idea, despite seeing her hiding behind her arm wrapped around her head and covering her eyes as she whistled.

“That's it!” Natha said, tossing the book on the table. Her sister jumped in surprise and looked at her angrily. “If we can't find a home, we'll either make one or conquer one!” She declared. The pink phox turned around and grabbed her tail. A small gap in her tail glowed pink and she reached into it, pulling out a sword from within her tail fur and aimed it up high. “I declare we take over Rome!” she said, her sword shining brightly against the dim light of the ceiling fan.

“Nonononono, none of that, none of that!” Zen yelled, standing up to try and take the sword away while Natha continued to shout declarations of where to rage war for control of the land; just like emperors and other conquerors have done. Dria sighed and shook her head leaning on both her hands as she aimlessly watched her sibling’s babble. Her eyes went over to the book her sister carelessly tossed on the table and she flicked her ears when she saw the picture.

“How about this?” Dria said, getting both of their attention. Zen stopped reaching for her sword and Natha took down her foot from Zen's face to keep him at bay and leaned over the table to see into the book. “It's called a monastery,” she said. “Take a look at the info and pictures they have here. It might be what we've been looking for this past half hour.”

Zen took the book and read over the description, while Natha leaned on his shoulders with her head between her brother's ears to read as well. “This could work,” Zen said with excitement “It has everything!”

“Yeah!” Natha agreed, the pink vixen wagging her three tails.

“A library for Zenith,” Zen listed.

“Yeah,” Natha said softly.

“A large kitchen for Naku.”

“Yeah.”

“A playhouse for Zenny, a meditation room for Nora, a ballroom for Zenium!”

“Yes, yes, yes!” Natha said, both agreeing and increasing the tone of her excitement.

“A garden for Zeno, a lounging area for Zenya, an alchemy lab for you Dria, and a dressing room for you Natha!” Zen said as he stood up.

“YEAH, YEAH, YEAH, YEAH!” Natha said, shaking her fist up and down in agreement with everything, giggling and shrieking with joy.

“We have our home!” Zen declared “ACK-”

His sister wrapped her arm around Zen's neck, cheering so much she didn't realize the loss of air her brother suffered. She cheered louder than Zen could plea for release. He grabbed her arm with both hands but couldn't pry it away from his throat.

Dria shook her head and sighed, slowly hitting her head on the table as she couldn't take the silliness of her sister or the assistance of her brother to it. She smiled softly as she looked at the floor, closing her eyes with a faint chuckle as the thought of a family out in the open might be worth trying.