Submission (#2135) Approved

     The air was warm and a bit muggy in Enmir; the thick canopy of green moss and lichen overhead trapped moisture from the marshes below and made movement slow and difficult for outsiders. The Onasis twins, Lumos and Whisper, however were used to the environment and so it was no surprise to their mothers when they heard the clear ringing of Lumos' laughing from outside their home. Whisper was mute, so of course they couldn't hear her laughing, but they knew that if Lumos was out there having a good time then her sister was absolutely with her and enjoying herself too.

     Bard and Arcadia had moved with their oldest daughter, Chime, to Enmir several years ago in preparation for the arrival of their twin daughters; wanting their family to be brought up in a safe, private space away from prying eyes and enemies the two wives had made on-the-job. The twin girls were like their mother, Bard, in that they appreciated the unkempt wild of Enmir's marshes. They both loved to go outside and play frequently- lucky for them the two of them were accustomed to the heavy air and mugginess, as they both had thicker coats with either a mane or pantaloons and a fluffy spinal ridge. Not so lucky for Bard and Arcadia- who had to bathe them later and somehow scrub out all of the gunk from their thick fur. The mothers were starting to think that their daughters would go out and find the muddiest, messiest puddles they could and just jump right in.

     On this day in particular the young girls had packed up a cute little picnic which Whisper carried on her back in a small brown rucksack. Arcadia helped them to pack it- however if the young kittoms had any say in how their lunch was packed, it would have all been sweets and snacks tossed haphazardly into the bag with no semblance of organization or consolidation of space. Arc carefully sorted and placed some peanut butter and jelly sandwiches in a little wooden sandwich container on the bottom, as well as a sealed bowl of various fruits and a couple canisters of water in there too. The family was mostly vegetarian; with both the girls enjoying fish because it was Bard's favorite- they had a habit of mimicking both of their mothers' and their habits and thankfully enough were not actually very picky eaters. They expended so much energy playing and causing trouble that the two little ones were hungry pretty often so they would eat almost anything their mothers gave them.

     Whisper decided to carry the bag this time, considering the last picnic she and her sister went on Lumos had carried the bag- and she wasn't very careful of anything. After tripping over every twisted branch they came across on the ground and slipping in every muddy puddle, Lumos had effectively smooshed and demolished their meal. The girls still played on their way to the picnic-sitethis time, of course- completely oblivious to Bard following them. The girls loved being independent together, generally preferring the company of one another over anyone else; however their mothers were never one to let their children out of their sight without fretting- so feigned freedom was freedm-enough for Lumos and Whisper. Whisp was more careful than her sister not to ruin their food while they were playing, though that's not to say that she wasn't pretty rambunctious herself.

     Tied to the rucksack of food was Whisper's lantern for her own pomu- this iteration of the lantern was a simple white star shape; the blue crystal inside of it illuminating with the same glow of her own luminous suffusion. Lumos tended to ruin her lanterns faster than Whisper, so she threw together a very simple conical shape which housed her own golden crystal. Normally their pomus would be running alongside the girls in the marshy woods; the pomus were with each other the way that Lumos and Whisper were with one another. They were very close- twins in their own right that they appeared for their respective kittom at the same moment. The twin girls were always with one another, and so their pomus were always manifesting alongside each other. It was rare to ever see one pomu but not the other.

     Lumos and Whisper weren't so lonely without their pomus out of the crystals; afterall they did have each other and that was always enough for them. They giggled and got their clothes and fur all muddy and wet from the natural swampy environment of Enmir. It had maybe only been 15 or 20mins of the girls winding the most conspicuous and indirect path to their picnic spot before they finally arrived. Being so young, they didn't realize that the first path they made to reach this spot didn't have to be the only one they used.

     The first time the twins had gone out to the picnic spot, it was by complete accident. They were playing and dancing around all of the twisted and gnarled trees- chasing each other and playing hide-and-go-seek, when they came upon the spot. Their pomus helped to guide them back the way they came, and so they memorized the path that they took and made sure to stamp their little paws into the ground and walk a path into the ground. This was the route that they always took- even though the picnic spot itself was a mere five-minute walk away from their home if they just cut through the woods more directly rather than winding all the way through it in a weird zigzag motion.

     After reaching the picnic spot, it was probably a good hour before either of the girls actually stopped to eat. Whisper had set the rucksack down in a dry spot on top of a chopped tree trunk when they got there- this was where they usually liked to eat when they went out like this, that tree stump was their own personal table. They would normally gather flat-ish stones to use as chairs and usually also collect smaller ones for their pomus to use as chairs, too, and they would all have a tiny picnic together. Much of the time the kittoms would work together collecting various glowing algae from the shallow marshes nearby as well as large leaves and big clumps of moss- anything that their overactive imaginations could possibly reason into a 'decoration' of sorts for their make-believe parties and their pretend-houses that they would make up while they were there.

     Getting to their "Secret Hideout" was still really exciting for Whisper and Lumos, so everytime they arrived they would climb on the trees and hang from the branches and play tag in the tiny clearing. It really wasn't much of an exciting space to anyone else, but to the sisters it was their own secret place where they could play pretend with their pomus and all time seemed to just melt away while they had fun. This time they simply secured their floating lanterns on the ground with small stones, right where their pomus would usually sit with them at their "tree stump table", before finally sitting down to eat.