Ye Gads. The primitives are taking over my brain! This can only mean I've developed yet *another* Personae somewheres. Darn it!)

Natpackers---don't hit me. If you do, I'm liable to retaliate by expanding on her part. <eg>

This is a sequel to: Vampire Prehistory According to Kyer
(Historians may want to stay away from these puppies. You have been warned.)

Out of the corner of his eye, LaUgh saw his son, Nicooglah skulking about the bushes in an uncharacteristically jerky manner. Stopping, starting, stopping, and then starting again; his body held tensely, while contrarily, his facial expression was as blank as a treatise on the major accomplishments of Mankind up to that point in time.

Not, LaUgh reflected, that it was unusual for Nicooglah to look like his last brain cell had died; still, this behavior was rather weird even for him.

Perhaps he should look into it. It had only been last week that the boy had inadvertently stumbled onto the local Witch-Doctor's home-made brew of Choco-flavored JuJu juice. Drank a whole cocoanut's worth dry, too. Had mumbled about "pretty teal" and "plenty of trunk space" for nights afterward. Never did figure out why he had fixated on the large, mossy green tree trucks that doted the neighborhood...

Oh well.

Suddenly, Nicooglah went leaping into the sky.

Great---now he would have to go after the boy! Couldn't have him careening into another volcano. Last time, the cave had smelled of sulphur something terrible. And the mud he'd tracked in! Despite what Joonet had claimed, LaUgh was not at all convinced that volcanic ash was good for the complexion and general soundproofing. There was just something *evil* about that muck that gave him the heebie jeebies. Only little blonde-haired girls made him more uneasy.

And, of course, Nicooglah.

Scowling, LaUgh took off into the air, confident that his superior speed would help him catch his abnormal offspring quickly.

Too quickly.

For some reason, Nicooglah decided to come to a dead halt in midair. The resultant collision knocked both CaveVamps out of the air, and rather painfully to the ground.

"Ooomph! Nicooglah! Get off of me!"

The former CocoanutBall player hastened to comply.

"Master? Are you playing too?" Nicooglah asked, eyes wide. "Gee, you sure goofed up! ?"

Taking a moment to tug his ebony skins back into order, his disgruntled sire raised an inquiring eyebrow. (Not that it had far to go up his face, his being a vampire-*Neandrathal* and all.)

"What?" the not-so-Ancient ---('cause at this point in history, *nobody* was ancient)--vampire huffed.

"You were supposed to stop."

LaUgh snorted disdainfully, roughly refixing the placement of his fish-spine collar pin, "And how was *I* to know this?"

"Because Joonet just said so," Nicooglah explained reasonably.

Momentarily forgetting his ire at his son, LaUgh glanced about, but his buxom daughter was nowhere to be seen. "She did?" he asked, wondering just where his son had found another Witch Doctor indulging in JuJu juice. He could have sworn that Naggedly, the female human who passed for the local medico to the Sabertooth tribe was still supposed to be vacationing in Choco-Ah-Lotta land.

"Nicooglah, you haven't been...imbibing again, have you?"

Nic looked down forlornly at his fluffy-mocassined feet. "No, sire. Nag was *really* upset about that. Threatened me with a 'downing shake' if I ever came near her equipment again."

"You mean she threatened to shake you down?"

Thoughtfully blank look.

"No... she specifically said something about downing a 'shake'. I figured it most be some *really* awful curse from the smell of the potion she stuck under my nose."

LaUgh decided that he really didn't want to go there, so he brought the conversation back to the subject on hand of where Joonet was.

"Oh, she's hiding," Nic grinned happily.

"Hiding?"

"Yeah," his son responded with rising excitement. "And I'm supposed to *find* her!"

"You are?" mused LaUgh, privately thinking that Joonet had found her own way of keeping Nicooglah at bay.

"Uh, huh. It's part of the rules."

"Rules," LaUgh parroted, thinking more and more that his supposition about Joonet had been correct.

"Rules of the game."

"*What* game? Oh, wait...don't tell me...hiding/seeking---Hide & Seek?" LaUgh haphazarded a guess. After all, if this was Joonet's game, it would have a logical sounding name. His daughter was one smart vampire. Something he despaired of his son.

"Green Eye--Fly"

"Green-eyed fly?" The Not-That-Old-And-Powerful CaveVamp blinked. How did pesky insects get into this conversation?"

"No, master! *Green Eye--Fly*."

"Ah...of course." (Silly me.)

"Joonet taught it to me!" Nicooglah exclaimed, nearly bouncing up and down with enthusiasm. "She hides---and I seek her out!"

LaUgh took a moment to think this out, but could not for the unlife of him find a correlation between what should have been Hide & Seek, and...<sigh>..Green Eye--Fly. "I'm afraid I don't follow," he finally confessed.

Nicooglah's expression fell. "They *are* rather hard to follow," he concured.

"What is?" Yes, the CaveVamp thought wearily, being undead was no cure for headaches.

"The rules."

What the hey. If he went insane, maybe he would begin to understand the boy.

"The rules?"

"Of the game."

Tar Pits take it! LaUgh's eyes reddened to a scarlet hue as he fought to keep from strangling his offpring. This circular talking was making him dizzy!

Nic grinned widely. "Yeah---*now* you got it! Only that's Joonet's part."

LaUgh caught himself just in time before he unthinkingly asked: part of what? Instead he used his most commanding tone to grate out: "Just. Tell. Me. The. Rules." (Before I do something *you* will regret!)

"Oh. Well, its kinda complicated because you have to remember which color means what. Like, when her eyes turn red, it means I have to stop and stand still,"----Nicooglah concentrated until his own eyes turned red----"Yellow,"---he concentrated again until his eyes glowed amber---"means I can only go slow. And green,"---his eyes slowly turned a yellowish-green color---"means I can fly!" He frowned. "I think. Or was it Red Eye--Flight? Lessee..." Nic began mumbling to himself with increasing speed---"Red, yellow, green, red, yellow, green, red, yellow, green", his eyes unconsciously changing hue like demented christmas lights going faster and faster. "Red. Yellow. Greenredyellowgreenredyellowgreen--"

Awash in the glow of the pre-Disco dance lights, LaUgh finally yelled: "Stop!"

The sharp sound jerked his son out of his self-induced trance.

One eye glowing red....the other a soft green.

"Ack!" his sire yelped, feeling his stomach lurch at the mismatched sight. "Don't *DO* that!"

Nicooglah blinked once, both his eyes assuming the dark blue he had started out with.

"Do what?"

"Never mind!" LaUgh told him, fighting down his gorge with pure force of will. "Just tell me how you know what color Joonet's eyes are if she hiding."

"Oh! She shows me in my mind. Says its all a case of projecting "mental pictures."

"Well, you *do* project a pretty good picture of a mental case." LaUgh muttered.

"What?"

"Nothing."

======================
End