[spookies] Ambedo's Ambling Abode

The stars were bright. The moons shone down in their blood-red glory. It was rather light out, considering the fact that it was the middle of the night. Logically if there was something scary coming, she could see it miles away. Azimuth knew all these things in her head. But her heart, now that was a different story altogether. She lay in her makeshift sleeping bag, a bundle of nerves. Even a Poum would be braver than she that night.

At that moment, the snapping of a twig alerted the fearful Symprite of something nearby. She squeaked – shrieked, really – in terror, and clawed her way from her sleeping bag over to her mother, lying peacefully on the grass.

“Mama!! Mama!! It’s coming to get me!!” she wailed, clutching the still-sleeping form of her mother as though she were a stable pillar in a fearsome gale.

“Guh…?” Ambedo grunted, unfocused blue eyes fluttering open. “Uh… Azi? Need something?” she sat up, viewing Azimuth’s terrified form with moderate confusion.

“Th-there was a thing!!! It was trying to get me!!!” hands shaking, the bappy pointed accusatorially at her sleeping bag.

“All right, let’s see.” Ambedo’s gravelly voice muttered, as she struggled over to the unlit campfire with a set of spark rocks. Two clicks later, the fire relit, and the culprit was revealed: a Fhionn peered from the head-high grass (head-high to Azimuth, of course), and skittered away in fright.

“Oh.” Flushed with embarrassment, Azimuth let go of her mother’s form, causing the older Symprite to sigh in relief. Afraid of a Fhionn, was she. Well, it had sounded scarier before she had known how big it was. Surely that was not her fault.

“Got a good grip kid, you have a future in professional holding-onto-things.” Ambedo said with extreme sincerity. Azimuth was not certain if her mother even knew what humor was, considering all of the things she said with a face straighter than a blade. It still made Azimuth giggle a bit.

“I’m… s-sorry, mama. I didn’t realize it wasn’t all that scary.” Azimuth apologized abashedly, looking down at the grassy ground beneath her hooves.

“Wasn’t your fault.” Ambedo replied, looking around to make sure that had been the only thing to be worried about in the darkness of the night. “I thought I already said this, but since this is your first big outing, you can feel free to come to me whenever you feel like.”

“Mhm.” Cheering up a bit, Azimuth nodded. This was her first outing, because she was now ten years of age! Her birthday was always heralded by the red glow of the moons as the double eclipses made their way across Capricorn-13. She and Ambedo were going out to a large stone ruin past Mizuno Village that Ambedo wanted to look at for… whatever reason she had this time. Maybe Azimuth would figure out the definite reason this time?

“I, um…” Azimuth mumbled, playing with her comically large ears as she tried to put her thoughts to words. “I… well, I can’t sleep really good right now, mama. Can you tell me a story?” she asked hopefully. Ambedo’s words were normally drier than Rhiza, but when she told stories, they blossomed forth with richness unrivaled as far as Azimuth was concerned. It was like drinking a warm beverage, thick beverage; intonations that carried one to sleep.

“Huh? Oh, sure. Let me think for a moment.” Ambedo hummed in thought, gritting the plant décor in her mouth as she did so. “Hmm. I have an idea. Here’s a story I don’t think I’ve told you before. Take a seat if you’d like, I don’t want you to fall asleep on your feet or anything.” The older Symprite decided and gestured to the sleeping bag. Grinning, Azimuth rushed over to the bag and sat atop it.

“Well, this happened quite a while ago.” Ambedo started, gazing up at the starry heavens as she recollected. “Actually, wasn’t far from here that it happened, either. I was adventuring during the night – bad idea, by the way – and I got completely lost. As it turns out, there are not a lot of landmarks around a straight-up grassland. Anyways, I was totally lost, and I came upon something pretty weird…”

“What was it?” Azimuth squeaked, wrapping herself in her comically large ears to keep her legs warm.

“A very tiny house. Tiny wood house. …Only, well, the weird thing was, I’d been in the area just a bit ago. I hadn’t seen a house there before. Yet there it was. It was like it had been built in a matter of hours, but it looked so, so old.” She trailed off, staring blankly at the stars. “…So of course, I knocked on the door. Someone who’s got a house right there had to know what was going on, I assumed. Plus, there were candles burning in the house.”

“So, who came to the door?” Azimuth asked.

“No one. …That didn’t stop me from opening the door, though.” Ambedo shrugged.

“Wha—mama, without permission from whoever lived inside??” Azimuth was flabbergasted by this breach of law. There were rules! You could only break into your own house, and also the houses of things that were so long-gone that they would not miss the stuff you were going to take! That was what she had learned about archaeology, at least.

“Well, the door was unlocked. What was I going to do? Throw my arms up and say, ‘I suppose I’ll continue to be lost out in the cold and the dark.’” Ambedo huffed. When Azimuth did not immediately respond, the older Symprite continued, “Well, I went into the house, and sure enough: empty. Empty of Symprites, at least. There were a lot of things all around the place, bits and baubles, and a big cauldron in the middle. And I didn’t realize it at the time… but hanging from the roof were more Sipzips than I could count.”

“Oh, cute!” Azimuth chirped.

“They’re cute until they’re nipping you half to death.” Ambedo murmured, nonchalantly looking at her webbed paws in contemplation.

“What???” Azimuth squeaked again, this time fearfully.

“That’s later into the story.” Ambedo shrugged. “Anyways, I decided to warm myself by the cauldron first. A fire was lit underneath it, and something really good smelling was boiling in the pot. Couldn’t tell what it was at the time, or for a lot of years, but I figured it out eventually… I’ll keep that a secret for now. I wasn’t about to taste it or anything, though. Just because I’d broken and entered doesn’t mean I was about to thieve and take.”

“Okay but like what happened after that??” Azimuth broke into Ambedo’s thievery thoughts, causing her to snap back into reality.

“Right, yes. Well, after I was good and warm, I decided I was going to look at all the stuff on the shelves. Again, not to take—”

“I get it, you didn’t steal anything mama.” Azimuth giggled. Ambedo paused, as though considering correcting her daughter, but she apparently decided against it.

“The shelves were definitely something. Shelves upon shelves of dried plants, herbs, pollen, tubers, petals, really if you could consider getting it from a plant it was on those shelves.” Ambedo continued on. “It was about at that moment, that I realized where I was, and that I should probably get out as soon as I could.”

“What? Why?” Azimuth yawned and asked her mother.

“I’d realized that there was only one kinda Symprite who would have a weird teleporty house and collect so many plants and Sipzips. It was… a witch.”

“A witch???” Azimuth squeaked, terrified once more.

“Yeah, and right as I realized that, and started walking to the door—slam. The door closed on me, and all the candles and cauldron fire went out immediately. Pitch black, and I’d put out my lantern when I’d broken and entered because it was so light inside. Should have… considered leaving it on, probably. Even when I made it to the door, though? Completely locked.”

“How did you get out???” Azimuth asked fearfully.

“Well, before I could even consider getting out, I heard a voice: ‘You’re a bold soul to wander into my abode without knocking!’ it echoed around on the wood walls like it was in my own head.” Ambedo raised her arms into the air, causing a massive shadow to be produced by the low flames. “Scared me half to death honestly. I don’t really know what got into me, but instead of freaking out and trying to run away, I charged straight at the sound of the voice. I knocked into the cabinets so hard that I broke some of the jars, and something red and sticky got all over me.”

“B-b-blood???” Azimuth wailed.

“Didn’t have time to figure it out at the time, because all of a sudden, one thousand glowing eyes landed upon me from above: the Sipzips were suddenly upset and started mobbing me! And to make it worse, the voice was suddenly laughing at me! I can still remember it to this day… hee hee haw haw haw!!!” Ambedo made the most emotional noise she had ever made at that moment.

“Why were they attacking you???” Azimuth squeaked.

“I didn’t know at the time, but eventually I figured it out. I was still in fight mode, and I wanted out of this house. In my panic I’d remembered that the house was made of wood, but the door—that had been made of a different, flimsier-feeling wood. So, before I could even think too much about the ramifications of what I was about to do, I did a 180 to where I knew the door was and rammed it with all the strength I had. Were my head any weaker, I’d have probably lost the battle to the door, but I was just strong enough to snap it straight off of its hinges. I was out, and the moment I was out, I was running.” Ambedo gestured to the air, as though it were her freedom.

“And you got away from there??” Azimuth asked hopefully, eyes lolling a little bit.

Ambedo shook her head. “Not exactly. I thought I had, and I was finally able to get rid of the last few Sipzips that didn’t get shaken off by that time I rammed a door with my face. I turned around—and suddenly, the house seemed to grow a bit, like it was… standing up.”

“Standing up? …The house stood up??” Azimuth shook her head as well to clear it. A witch made sense to her, a pack of bloodthirsty Sipzips, a cauldron that unlit at will… she could rationalize all of those things. But the house itself stood up? Why would it do such a thing??

“It was again one of those ‘I had no idea at the time’ moments. But it definitely stood up, and it turned to me, the lights glowing once again, and a window burst open on the front. Then, the voice came again: ‘You’re gonna pay for that, kid!’ it howled. Then, suddenly, the house came charging at me!”

“Charging??” Azimuth yawned, her eyes waxy with sleep.

“Okay… it wasn’t very fast. It felt faster because I was freaking out about it, though. Also, I was already tired from the super long walk I’d done before that, and it was the middle of the night, and also, I’d just been mauled by Sipzips… it was just a lot, if you get me.” Ambedo tried to protect her pride. Azimuth nodded silently—although it could have been more of a wobble. Azimuth herself was unsure what it had been, if she were being completely honest with herself. She so very much wanted to hear the whole story, but her brain was slowly taking her to sleep.

“I ran, and I ran, as fast as I could, but no matter how fast I ran I felt like it was always right behind me… and then I started to slow down. I wasn’t very fit back then.” Ambedo stated, as though she were fit now. “Before I knew it, I tripped over a rock I hadn’t seen in the ground, and I was on the ground. Then… the house was right above me, and the glowering face of a Symprite I couldn’t see –the witch – glared over me.”

“And you… got out?” Azimuth had repositioned herself to be laying on the sleeping bag as opposed to sitting on top of it. What could she do? Her body was falling asleep right quick!

“Not exactly… the Symprite got out, picked me up by the biote, and… well, demanded payment for breaking all of her jars and door.” Ambedo said this last part quietly. Ambedo was not one to showcase embarrassment easily. It again made Azimuth giggle.

“Mama…! You said you weren’t going to steal anything! But you stole a door and a whole bunch of stuff! The Symp maybe she was a witch, but you were a thief…!” Azimuth giggled loopily.

“Yeah, well, I was pretty freaked out. Turns out this Symprite liked to… prank… visitors to the region by setting up her house in odd places, and then giving them a spook by putting out all the lights. Witches, for goodness’ sake…” Ambedo sighed. “But I paid for all the stuff I’d broken, and she let me free. Made sure the Sipzips weren’t going to chase me, either. From then on, I learned a few important lessons. One, don’t wander around at night, even if you’re trying to find a town, you’re just going to get yourself further lost if you do that. Two, don’t break and enter peoples’ houses unless you’re sure they’re pretty gone. And three, don’t break jars you don’t know what they’re filled with. Thankfully, the Symprite was kind enough to tell me which way the nearest town was, and I got there right before sunrise happened. But… when I asked the townsfolk who that Symprite was, they all said that, while they had all heard stories of a Symprite with a moving house, they had never actually seen them. I’d basically met a local legend, and despite the fact that I’ve been back here many, many, many times, I’ve still never seen them again.”

Azimuth made no response to any of this.

“…Azi? Did you want to know the secret of the story?” Ambedo grunted and looked over to her daughter. Azimuth was deeply asleep, wrapped in her ears like a bappy swaddled in a blanket.

“I didn’t realize I was that boring… oh well.” Ambedo shrugged to herself. She carefully tucked the tuckered bappy back up in the sleeping bag and stamped out the fire a second time. It had basically been embers anyhow, but it was safer to make sure. Sighing, Ambedo settled herself back in her grassy pile, placed her beat-up hat over her eyes, and joined her daughter in the dreamy realm of sleep.

…Azimuth’s sleep was not restful, though, not for very long at least. As the ground began to rumble beneath her, she was rudely awakened once again. “Uh… huh??” Azimuth blinked the last of the sleep from her eyes again and sat up in her blanket. All she had remembered from the end of the story was Ambedo having to pay for the stuff she had broken… but why was the ground rumbling?

Looking around, Azimuth spotted something in the distance. It was hard to tell what it was at first… large shapes moving across the horizon. One of them was squat, but with tall objects placed atop them like chimneys. The second was taller, more square, like… a house? Was it a house, moving across the hillsides?? Azimuth stood up; sleep was gone from her mind once again. She was seeing it, the thing that Ambedo had been telling the story about: a house, or maybe even two houses, moving across the hilltops! Without even thinking of telling her mother, Azimuth began to run towards them. Maybe she could catch up before they got too far away!

At first, it seemed promising; they seemed to only shrink slightly as Azimuth ran behind them. However, as time passed, it became clear that the house—or houses—were moving at a pace much faster than the bappy would ever be able to keep up with. And, before long, Azimuth tripped over a rock and splatted onto the ground with a thud.

“W-wait!! Wait up please!!” Azimuth yelled, bringing herself back up to her feet, and waving with her arms and ears.

It seemed like the house was about to disappear completely from her vision, but right before it did, one of the glowing windows burst open, and the indistinguishable face of a Symprite peered out. It grinned evilly and howled into the night with a sound that rattled Azimuth to her core: “Hee hee haw haw haw!!!” and with that, the house was gone. The ground was still. Azimuth was panting harder than she ever had before. So close…! But, if she were being honest with herself, she would be glad she had not been able to keep up. Dusting herself off, she turned back around and began to make her way back to the campsite where her mother was still sleeping.

Ambedo was not still sleeping when Azimuth returned. She did not look all too concerned however. “I literally think I told you that story to tell you not to run off in the middle of the night and get lost?” the older Symprite lightly scolded Azimuth as the bappy dashed over to her side.

“Mama!! The thing, from the story, that you were just telling me about!! I just saw it now!!!” Azimuth gasped, shaking her mother as though she were a flapping rope in a storm.

“Huh?” Ambedo grunted.

“The moving house!!! And I even heard the laugh… hee hee haw haw haw you said?? I just heard it again! It’s going that way!!” Azimuth raised her arms up into the air to mimic how big the house had been.

“Really? Huh, cool.” Ambedo looked up at the sky ponderously and nodded.

“…You don’t believe me?” Azimuth sounded crushed.

“What? No, I believe you. You didn’t get seen by them- the Symprite inside, did you?” Ambedo shook her head quickly.

“Yeah, they did. AND they laughed really hard.” Azimuth crossed her arms.

“You didn’t mention me, did you?” Ambedo asked.

“No, why?” Azimuth asked, tilting her head to the side in confusion.

“When I paid them for the damages? …I massively underpaid them. I thought I’d given them five Diamonds, but I gave them five Gold instead. It was…” Ambedo flinched under her daughter’s glare. “Azi, it was dark. I didn’t do it on purpose I swear. …If you see them again don’t mention me.” The Symprite leaned back in the grass again, looking nonchalant about a topic she was obviously not very nonchalant about.

Azimuth sighed. “Mama… what are you gonna do when I move out? You’re gonna be a mess again!” she laughed and tucked herself into the sleeping bag again.

“Oh yes, I will. It’s my specialty. Try to actually sleep this time, though, Azi. We have a big day tomorrow.” Ambedo nodded in agreement.

“Okay… good night, mama.” Azimuth beamed and laid her head down to rest.

“Good night, Azi.” Ambedo responded.

And with that, the two Symprites both drifted off to sleep, for good that time.