Young Writers Society

"Basically," they confirmed, turning to Thytes as his question registered. They tried to come up with the best answer - they had, just not in the way that Thytes was expecting. "I looked a little into everyone's when I was moving your souls, but it wasn't intentional. Souls house magic, so it was a side effect of the process."

"Oh," said Thytes. He tried to hide his disappointment by taking another sip of his hot chocolate, but ended up spilling some on himself. Of course it hadn't been long enough for it to cool down.

As Thytes tried to wipe hot chocolate off his robes and face, humming angrily, Tristan set his mug down on the kitchen counter. "How much longer are we waiting around for?" the otter said, looking over at Rekune.

"Until Blanx can get permission," Rekune said. He glanced over at the window. "But even when he does, we'll probably wait until morning comes - it's getting close to night now, and I don't think it's a good idea for us to go in there when we're half asleep."

Tristan followed Rekune's gaze to the window. "Next morning?" he said, staring at the blues and purples of an evening sky. "And they're not going to do anything to our bodies before then?"

"They won't," he reassured him with a smile. "Even though Philosophorum is functional at night, they typically don't do experiments then - it makes more sense to do them in the daylight."

"Hmm," Tristan said, staring out the window. He didn't sound too confident.

Kynan took the opportunity to wrap an arm around Tristan. "Any place here where we can sleep for the night?" the hound said, looking at Rekune. "The couch? A bedroom?"

Rekune glanced over Blanx. The timing was nearly perfect - Blanx was just in the process of slipping his phone into his pocket. "We've been given an exception," he said.

Magic felt relief flood them; they wouldn't be forced to sneak away from either the two reapers or other members of their administration on top of sneaking around Philosophorum.

"I think we're sleeping on the couch," Mage quietly said, pointing down with the hand that had been stroking his boyfriend's hair. Knight was fast asleep on his lap, an absolutely adorable expression on his face as he snuggled into Mage's thigh.

Rekune smiled. "I guess so." He glanced over at Blanx. "Where should the others sleep?"

The reaper thought for a moment. "The couch Magic and Landon are on is a reclining one, so we can use that as one bed. There's also a guest bedroom down the hallway - that one has a bed and a pullout couch."

Magic glanced over at Landon. "Want to use this one? We're already laying here-"

"Not so fast," Rekune interrupted. "We might need our energy for tomorrow, but there's no point in going to bed now - it's only just getting dark! Seeing that we all have seats in front of the TV, I think now's the perfect time to watch a movie."

Magic immediately perked up.

"I'm very down for that," they agreed.

Untying and slipping off his robes, Thytes, in his blue boxers, stretched and yawned. He went back to sitting on one end of the couch, patting the seats next to him while looking over at Kynan and Tristan. "I am not familiar with one of these movies," Thytes said, moving his gaze to Rekune and Blanx, "But they sound entertaining, and I would rather like to celebrate the opportunity we have been given to reacquire our bodies."

Walking over, the otter and the hound set their hot chocolate on the table and sat down on the couch. Tristan leaned against Kynan, who rested against Thytes. Extending an arm over the both of them, Thytes smiled.

Then they all stared at the black screen in front of them. "Is this that TV you mentioned?" Thytes said.

Landon blinked and nodded quickly to acknowledge the couch question, opening his mouth to tell Magic that sharing the couch with them was completely fine with him, when he was cut off.

He brightened considerably after Rekune mentioned watching a movie, and shared Magic's smile.

"Yes! Absolutely." He glanced over at Thytes, excitement shining in his eyes. "No way- you don't know what TV is? I mean- actually, yeah, that makes sense, but- oh boy. You're in for a treat."

He actually took a moment to rub his hands together, and looked over at the lion gleefully.

"It's like- like movie pictures, basically. It's really hard to explain, but you'll see!"

Well, Thytes didn't know what to make of the idea of moving pictures. But Landon and the others seemed to be excited about it, so he figured it couldn't be that bad.

"What movie are we going to watch?" he said. "Is there more than one?"

"Oh, there's many movies," Magic said, a grin stretching from ear to ear. They looked over at Thytes. "You know how there's countless books on everything you could possibly imagine? Movies are just like that! What type of stories do you like to hear about?"

The lion blinked. "I have not a clue. I can read and write, but my father much preferred that I focus purely on military texts, and I did not make it a habit to visit the library. Something funny would be nice? We could all use a laugh right about now."

"What about everyone else?" Magic asked, turning to the others in the room. "There's a lot of comedies, so we should narrow our options down before asking Rekune to find something."

"Knight loves almost any story he can get his hands on," Mage said, giving his boyfriend's hair a nice rub. "I like adventures, but I'm the same way."

"Romance?" Kynan said. He glanced up at Thytes - he'd expected the lion to come up with something like that. Which would've been nice, because it was a little awkward to have to speak up and bring attention to himself, nestled between his friend and his boyfriend. Still, Thytes hadn't suggested romance, there were a few couples here, and Kynan had always been a romantic at heart.