Disclamier: The Gargoyles belong to Buena Vista and are used with out permision. Sata, the twins, and Nudnik belong to the folks at the Gargoyles fan site (I think) Robin (not Puck) is mine. Thanks.
The young man looked as if he had hiked across the country. Everything from his patched green over flannel to his brown work boots were covered in dust. He stood in front of the Eryrie building staring up into the sky watching the sun set behind it. A loud rustling of wings followed by a muffled sound that could have been a roar accompanied the sun's last rays. Brushing a strand of yellow red hair behind his ear the young man walked into the front lobby of the Eryie building.
"Hello?" he asked the front security guard who was absorbed in a baseball game on the small TV behind his desk. Startled the guard looked up his eyes focusing into the young man's unusual reddish eyes.
"Can I help you?"
"Yeah, does a Owen Burrnet work here?"
"He does." The guard answered.
"May I speak with him?"
"Him? And not Mr. Xanatoes?"
"Yes."
"I'll call him and see what he says. He's a very busy man." The guard said picking up the phone. He hit a speed dial button and then looked at the young man. "What is your business with him?"
"Personal...Family." The guard blinked in surprise but kept most of his composure.
"Ah hello sir, yes there's a young man at the front desk a uh Mr...."
"Robin, Robin Trace." The red eyed young man said.
"Trace, Robin here to see you...uh-huh yes he's standing right here. You'll be right down? Okay." He hung up the phone, "He says that he'll be right down and for you to wait."
"Of course." He paused. "Want to see a card trick?"
Before the guard could answer the elevator doors slid open and the neatly pressed but slightly stressed Owen walked out. His eyes flickered around the lobby before landing on Robin, doing so they widen and then narrowed. He walked stiffly up to the desk and took the young man by the arm back into the elevator. As the doors closed he glared at Robin.
"I thought you were with your mother."
"I was. She's in jail." He shrugged unconcerned. "Said, and I quote 'go and bother your father for a time, maybe you'll pick up something useful' and I don't think she meant traits."
"She wants bail?" Owen asked paling.
"Phshah, no. She wants me off her hands. Thought getting thrown in jail would get rid of me but..." he left the sentence hang as the doors slid open. Owen led him through the great hall to his office at a quick pace, eyes constantly scanning to see if anyone else was about. He then shoved the door closed and locked it when they were both inside. Robin whistled in appreciation as he toured to office. "Nice office very proper. Very Owen." He paused to lean against the desk and fold his arms expectantly. Owen looked back at him blandly but off in thought. "Well?"
"If you are waiting for something magical to happen I'm afraid that you're going to be disappointed."
"Why? You can't change during business hours or something?"
"I can't change at all." He said flatly. The red haired young man stared at him in disbelief.
"What do you mean you can't change, you're Puck for crying out loud!" Robin yelped. Owen looked slightly alarmed at his volume of his voice. "Give me one reason why you can't."
"Oberon has decreed that I am forbidden to use my powers."
"Oh...Oberon's the head fairy guy right?" Owen frowned. Robin grinned, "I'm kidding, I know who he is. You told me about enough times."
Owen kept his frown on as he sat behind his desk and began to work on a spending report that he had left behind to retrieve Robin. The young man tapped his foot for a minute as if waiting for something.
"I have to finish this, you will wait until I'm done if you wish to stay." Owen instructed him. Rolling his eyes Robin yanked a chair out of thin air and began to play a game of solitaire, placing the cards on the air. Over the top of his screen Owen discreetly watched as the cards flipped themselves into the appropriate stacks and tried to suppress a smile. Robin was very un-Owen; Owen would disapprove of such blatant magic behavior he had to remind himself. He was scruffy, rude, and dusty. He was very dusty. He was getting dust all over the place.
"When was the last time you washed?"
"My clothes or myself?" Robin asked looking up from his game. Owen just looked at him. "Not for a while, on either accounts...What?"
"You have enough initiative to create a chair, surely you have enough to clean yourself."
"I didn't have the time or the opportunity. People think it's kinda funny if you enter the restroom wearing one thing and come out wearing another if you didn't bring it with you." Owen's face twitched slightly. With a slight, ever so slight sigh of exasperation he stood up and beckoned Robin to follow him.
Taking him down one of the more obscure and hardly used corridors in the castle Owen led him to the guest quarters. He opened one of the doors and after checking to make sure that it wasn't in use, he let Robin in. "You can use this room. Please stay here until I come back."
"Where are you going?" he asked eyeing the bathroom with a shower.
"It's almost time for Master Alexander's lessons. I must attend to those and a few other matters."
"Oh." Robin gave him a grin and shut the door. As he started down to the nursery Owen remembered that Robin hadn't promised to stay. A feeling of dread crept down his spine. He half turned back, but thought against it, the Puck was interested in seeing what would happen.
Outside the nursery's open door Robin invisibly watched as "Uncle" Puck greeted the young Alexander in a shower of rainbows and dancing bears. The baby laughed and clapped his hands then raised himself up into the air. His eyes narrowed and his faced pulled in a frown. "If he doesn't have time hang with me, then I'll just have to go and find something else amusing to do." He said to himself quietly slipping away. For a second Puck turned his head to the door but then Alexander demanded his attention.
"Today, my boy, we're going to play a game of hide and seek!" he said as Robin crept out of earshot.
The castle halls, while well lit, still gave a feeling of shadows and flaming torches. Noise, coming from a near by room, drew Robin. A loud crash followed by children's voices echoed down the hall. A small gar-beast tore out of a room and bounded down the hall towards him.
"NUDNIK!" a male voice of about nine yowled and a beaked green gargoyle followed with a brick red female gargoyle of the same age the beast into the hall. Nudnik skidded to a stop right in front of Robin and after sniffing in the air began to growl softly. The two young gargoyles stopped right before slamming into the beast but not before the girl crashed into the boy.
"What is it boy?" the boy, Graeme asked, kneeling down. The halfling tried to edge away but Nudnik followed. "I think he smells something, Ariana."
"Go get it," Ariana suggested to Nudnik. The beast wagged its tail uncertainly but in its puppy youth it jumped. Robin let out a yelp and held out his hands. A burst of white energy escaped his palms and coated Nudnik and the gargoyles. It however didn't stop the beast and he landed on the young man's chest. They fell to the floor, and Robin had Nudnik growling in his face.
"Get it off!" he snarled to the twins.
"Uh-uh. Stay boy." Graeme said and then crossed his arms. "Now who are you?"
"And what are you doing up here?" Ariana interjected.
"And if I tell you, you'll get this mutt off of me?"
"If we believe you." The pinned Robin shrugged.
"My name is Robin Trace. I'm here visiting my da, Owen."
"Liar. Owen doesn't have any kids, he's Puck." Graeme said and then turned to his sister, "Go get dad and Goliath, they'll know what to do with him."
"It's true, if he wasn't how was I able to turn invisible, look at my ears."
"Just cause your ears are pointed doesn't mean Owen's your dad. Go get them Ari." Ariana scampered off leaving Graeme and Nudnik to guard the intruder.
Most of the gargoyle clan was gathered around the dinner table when she came barreling. Before she could speak her father Brooklyn came in with a worried expression. He looked around the room scanning for something.
"Have you seen Ariana or Graeme? They were supposed to come right here after practice." He asked. Ariana smiled to herself and then stepped up to the clan.
"Father, Goliath, everyone come quickly we've caught an intruder." She said waving her hands. No one noticed her. A jade colored gargoyle wearing a kimono came into the room with a puzzled expression and walked right through the hatchling. Ariana gasped in surprise. She moved to grab her mother's robe but her hand passed through the silk fabric. Backing up slowly she left the room and ran back to her brother.
"Graeme, Graeme!" she cried coming up to her twin.
"Where's everyone?" Graeme started to ask.
"He did something to me." she said pointing to Robin. "Mother walked right through me like if I wasn't there, and no one heard me."
"You mean you're like a ghost?" he asked and backed away a bit from Robin. This gave the youth a chance to scramble out from under the beast and run off disappearing down the hall. "HEY come back here!" he yelped. He glanced at his sister and then they dashed after him.
The castle corridors became a labyrinth that blurred by as Robin tried to find his way around and avoided the youngsters. A half open door beckoned him to take a chance and he scuttled in shutting the door and slouching against it.
"Oh, great, oh great. He's gonna skin me alive. Shoulda stayed put but no hadda go an' take a looksie. See what Da', the great Puck, was up to. Who are you kidding? Mum was right, I am worthless." He babbled to himself trying to gather his scattered thoughts together. " 'Ye be worthless boy, kint do magic properly, kint do anythin' properly' she'd say. Stupid, stupid, stupid." He sighed and ran his hands through his hair before taking a good look around the room. Most of the furniture was covered in dust cloths, except for a bookcase of books. Three small arched windows let in the city lights. Pulling himself up from the ground he trailed his fingers on the edges of the bookcase, trying to imagine what sort of things were under the cloths.
A small giggle next to his ear startled him, and he spun around coming face to face to a smiling baby Alexander. The baby laughed as he hovered and the patted Robin on the nose. "Found!" he cried happily.
"Go away!" Robin hissed back.
"No." he began to spin in summersaults in the air laughing. Robin made a grab for him. The baby swerved out of the way. Growling he jumped up into the air himself and snatched the baby. "NO!" Alex yelped at the same time that Robin cried "Gotcha!"
A brief struggle ensued as the baby struggled to get free and the youth tried to hold on. Both gritting their teeth they let out a burst of unfocused magical energy at each other. The pulse snapped back at them and enveloped them sending them to the floor. When the light cleared Graeme and Ariana burst into the room with Nudnik by coming through the door. They skidded to a stop and stared.
"What happened?" Ariana asked. Robin looked at her.
"What do you-" he stopped and grabbed his throat. "My voice!" it was an octave higher. He looked at himself; his clothes hung loosely about him several sizes to big for him. His fingers were smaller and now that he thought about it, all of him was smaller- younger. He looked around bewildered, Ariana and Graeme looked back at him. Alexander sat next to him, naked, staring at himself. He looked about nine, as did Robin.
"I'm old!" Alexander said surprised.
"Lovely." Robin snapped and scrambled up. Before anyone could reply he ran out of the room, leaving his boots behind.
"After him!" Graeme yelped. The three gargoyles dashed after him.
"Wait for me!" Alexander cried and went after them.
"Great, great, great." Robin muttered as he ran down the hallways. A door opened and Xanatoes stepped out with Fox. The halfling skidded to a stop right in front of them. "Oh bladder-wart!" he yelped and started to turn around, but Xanatoes grabbed him by his over-sized shirt collar.
"Hold it kiddo," the multi-billionaire said. The boy squirmed around trying to wiggle free from the shirt but Xanatoes had him by the arms. "What are you doing here."
"None of you business." He shot back and then got a good look at his keeper. "YOU! This is all your fault! It's your fault he's... he's become borin' and can't do fun stuff with me!" he lashed out a foot and just by sheer luck managed to connect. Surprised he was dropped and taking the opportunity he ran off again.
"What was that all about?" Fox asked. David shrugged, and pulled out his cell phone.
"I don't know." He put the phone to his ear and waited a moment "Hello Owen? Yes there's a child- about nine with red hair loose in the castle. Yes nine, with red hair eyes? I don't know I didn't..." his voice trailed off as Alexander came into view, stark naked, "Alex?" he and Fox said at the same time
"Daddy?" the once baby asked.
"What happened?" His mother asked reaching out at the same time stepping back in shock.
"I don't know, I was playing with uncle Puck and ran into this stranger. He had magic too. Our magic hit each other and well..." he scratched his head. He then looked up to his side as if he was listening to someone talk, "Oh and Ariana and Graeme ran into him earlier and turned them into ghosts."
"Ghosts? Oh Owen I'm sorry, you heard? Yes, he's about nine too. No they're not the same person...no I don't know where he went. Yes I think you should get here."
"Nudnik knows." Alex said suddenly. Fox looked down at him and finally took in that he wasn't wearing any clothes.
"That's fine honey, but you're coming with me first." She said and steered him away. "We'll be right back." She said to her husband. He nodded and then stared out dubiously into the corridor where the gargoyles were supposed to be. He didn't see any, at least not for a long moment. The gargoyles that he did end up seeing however weren't the children; they were their parents with worried expressions.
"Hello Brooklyn, Sata." He said in greeting. "Interesting night isn't it."
"I have no idea what you are talking about," the white haired gargoyle said. "Have you seen Ariana or Graeme? They haven't shown up for dinner."
"Well... I haven't seen them, but Alex has, or so he says. He should be right back with Fox and then maybe we can find them. There is another problem; a nine-year-old boy with red hair appears to be the cause of their disappearance. He too has vanished, and I think it is imperative that he be found as well."
"I think that problem is solved," Sata said and gestured behind Xanatoes where Fox was coming back with Alex now wearing one of his father's shirts and socks.
"No... that's part of the problem."
"Hullo, Uncle Brooklyn, Aunt Sata." Alex said and then cocked his head; "Ariana and Graeme are right here. They say 'hi' too. And don't worry they're fine."
"I don't understand. My children are here? But I can't see them." Sata began, a bit of panic flickering in her eyes.
"They're ghosts." Alex explained. The bit of panic grew.
"I believe what he means to say is that they are like ghosts, not actually dead, madam." Owen said stepping into the conversation.
"Yeah."
"Owen?" Fox asked, "Can you explain what is going on, and why I some how missed most of my son's growing up?"
"I'm afraid not. However I may know the cause of the problem." He turned to Alexander and where Ariana and Graeme should be. "Did the individual you encounter have red eyes, by chance." The boy turned to his invisible friends and then back to the blond haired man.
"Yeah, I- we think so." Owen nodded, a look of displeasure crossing his face.
"Then, sirs madam, it is my fault."
"Your fault?" Brooklyn asked expressing the sentiment that crossed everyone's mind.
"The young man- boy that most of you have encountered is my son. I'm afraid I didn't take a strong enough hand in raising him and he turned out rather like his mother." A long silence ensued.
"I didn't know you were married..."
"I'm not. I would rather not talk about it." He said flatly. Another long awkward silence followed.
"How do we right this?" Sata asked.
"Find Robin. He's the only one who can undo these spells," and then to himself he added "...if he knows how." Alexander looked up at him funny for a secondbut then turned away. "You said that Nudnik can find him?"
"Yeah, that's how Graeme found him in the first place."
"And you can see them?"
"Yeah, they're right there, making faces." He said with a wide grin. Owen wondered if he was telling the truth or not, it was impossible to know.
"Good, then you and them, with one of us can look for him." Brooklyn said breaking into the conversation. "Shame we can't get Bronx into this search. But he'd need something to get a scent."
"Like a boot? Cause when he got small he left them behind." Alexander asked. Brooklyn smiled.
"Yeah, that'll do."
The city streets were impossibly far down Robin noted in one small unpanicked part of his mind as he climbed up onto the castle's battlements. A strong wind gusted across at irritating intervals, constantly threatening to blow him away, but never did. His fingers and toes were numb from the cold air and stone that he clung to in his search for some where to hide. He finally fell into a sheltered and shadowed spot away from the main castle and huddled in his now oversized clothes.
"Always running away aren't ya," he muttered to himself. "Might have been nice here, even though dad's stuck, but you just had to go and screw everything up." He then snorted "Of course don't even know if he'd let me stay. And now look at me: nine years old, again. As if the first time around wasn't bad enough." He paused in his personal rant when he heard a scratching noise on the side of the wall. Curious, but filled with a tingling of dread, he scuffled over to the edge and peered out. Down below him climbing up vertically was a large gar- beast, nose to the "ground" snuffling. Bronx lifted his head up and growled. Robin back peddled quickly and ran into a pair of legs. The legs belonged to a beautiful gargoyle with sable hair and purple skin. He gaped up at her in shock and delight.
"You must be Robin." Angela said.
Robin's jaw flapped loosely as he tried to come up with something to say. His mind wasn't in synch with his body. "Yeah... I mean yes, that's... I am he." He spluttered. She offered him a hand and he took it carefully. Her skin was soft almost like smoothed marble he thought and before he was up he jerked it away, stumbling slightly. "Who are...you seem to have...what's your..." he babbled slightly trying to get something coherent and intelligent out.
"I'm Angela."
"It's a pleasure to meet you." He said holding out his hand. She smiled at him like he was a little kid, causing him a flash of irritation. Of course she thinks you're a little kid, you look like one! He snapped to himself as they shook hands.
Bronx took this moment to come over the edge with a loud snuffling growl. He padded over somewhat menacingly in the halfling's direction. Robin let out a small but terrified yelp and jumped backwards. Angela caught him and hoisted him up into her arms before scowling at the beast.
"Bronx, be nice. He's only a child!" she scolded. The gargoyle beast whined and hung his head. "You're such a puppy." She said and then to Robin who was somewhat happily sitting in her arms, resting his head on her chest, "It's all right he won't hurt you." She began to smooth his hair and he sighed with a wisp of a smile on his face.
He closed his eyes and relaxed letting his mind wander, wondering if she was involved with anyone, and wished that he was back to normal as the sable haired gargoyle drifted down to the courtyard. He felt a slight tingling over his body and then Angela was pushing against his embrace. Quickly he opened his eyes, saw that he was looking levelly into her face and holding her against his re-aged body hovering about twenty feet off the ground. He loosened his grip as she stared at him in surprise.
"That was unexpected." He said with a slightly crooked grin. She broke completely free and glided down away from him in a hurry. He cursed, still up in the air watching her go. Bronx, below him took a running leap and snagged his pants, jerking him to the ground. The beast then dragged him, by the leg, into the main hall; Robin screaming and yelling to be let go. The requests were ignored.
In the main hall the clan and the Xantoses were assembled as Bronx came in with his head held high. Angela was standing very close to the rotund Broadway and moved closer when she saw whom Bronx was dragging. Goliath stepped forward.
"Bronx let him go." He commanded. With a loud slurp the leg was let go as the halfling was deposited in their midst. Robin grimaced gingerly touching his pant's leg.
"Eww." He muttered fingers coming up with drool. A shadow fell over him and he looked up into his father's scowling face. "Oh hullo dad..." he said rather meekly.
"Get up." Owen demanded. Robin stood up and stared at his bare feet.
"Look I have a pretty good idea about what you're going to say... but I never promised to stay in my room. And just because you can't do any magic ... or so you say... doesn't mean that I can't."
"Do you have any idea of what you have done?" Owen asked.
"Maybe..." ten pairs of eyes glared at him, and Sata took a step forward. Brooklyn put out a blocking arm, just in case. Robin cringed. "Yes."
"Fix it. I want my children back." Sata said. "Now." Her eyes began to glow red. Robin looked at his father, but his face was stone. He gulped. Licking his lips his gaze flicked around the room as he wrung his hands. His eyes closed and then fluttered back open. The color in his already pale face drained.
"I... can't. I don't know why but I can't..." he said somewhat shakily running his fingers through his hair. Sata growled and looked prepared to leap but for her mate's restraining arm.
"What do you mean, you can't?" she asked instead. Robin tried to run again but found himself somewhat surrounded. His eyes widened in panic and almost like a scared rabbit he seemed to shrink staring at the infuriated Sata. His breathing became ragged and he clapped his hands against his head with a wild shriek he screamed.
"STOP STARING AT ME!"
Accompanying it was a flash of bluish white energy. The light bathed the entire room and suddenly there were three more gargoyles in the room. Robin sank to his knees exhausted as the now visible Nudnik began to butt his head against his legs. Ariana and Graeme jumped eagerly chattering excitedly into their mother's outstretched arms. Alexander had reverted to his normal age and seemed oblivious to what had just happened happy to chew on his father's T-shirt in his mother's arm.
Owen knelt down and grasped his son's arm firmly, dragging him up from the floor.
"Let me go." Robin snarled and yanked his arm free.
"Robin." The blond haired man began, but stopped when his son held up a warning finger.
"Don't. Don't even go there with me and your insufferable know it all personality or what not. You haven't the right to lecture me." He said and stormed out.
The wind had picked up into a steady stream, blowing Robin's hair into his face as he stood, bare foot, against the parapets of the castle. His hands gripped the stone tightly as if he was trying to squeeze water from them as he stared down at the lights below. Slowly, when he heard someone's footsteps behind him, he climbed up onto the wall and spread out his arms.
"Do you think that if I jumped, he would care?" he asked out loud to the someone behind him. "Or do you think he'd be upset because then he'd have to explain why someone jumped off the top of the building to the press?"
"I think he would care." Came the answer, in Angela's soft lilting voice.
"Really?" he answered back, "I think he'd be annoyed because of the mess it would cause." He held a foot out experimentally and then craned his head back to look at the lavender gargoyle watching her expression. "I suppose you want an apology for what I did earlier." Angela didn't say anything for a long moment. Robin brought his foot back onto somewhat solid ground.
"He's worried about you, you know." She said.
"Who? Mr. Dead people have more life than me?" Robin asked sarcasm dripping from every syllable. "How could you tell? Did his face move?"
"No. But I could tell." She jumped up onto the parapet next to him. "He is a father-"
"You'd never know it." He replied wind whipping his hair around into her face. "He never writes, never calls."
"Still you should talk to him." This time Robin did step off the wall. He hung in the air facing Angela anger smoldering in his eyes.
"Oh yes I should. 'Gee dad I'm sorry for making a wreck of your life.' 'That's okay Robin just as long as you never show your face around here reminding me of my past mistakes and the fact that I can't become Puck any more (except apparently for some strange reason when playing with someone else's child), I'll forgive you.' 'Oh sure dad you're right even though I'm not the one who made the mistakes. I think I'll go and hitchhike my way back to Nevada and hang around like a bum for the rest of my eternal life or until mother gets out on bail, whichever one comes first. That way you'll never even have to think of me again.' 'Thank you Robin, I sure appreciate your understanding of my horrible situation having to work for one of the richest men in the world in a nice and comfy castle. By the way would you like some money for the bus, it's the least I can do for you after all you are my son?' 'No thank you dad seeing as how you're so busy, I wouldn't want to inconvenience you, I'm just going to go and crawl back to the trailer park that I was living in and maybe rob a convince store to get some food.'" He paused in his mock conversation. "Should I continue?" he asked. Angela shook her head.
"You don't actually believe what you just said do you?" She asked. "That you're a mistake?"
"I'm not a mistake," he began and Angela looked relieved, "I'm the result of an experiment of his. How Owen can I be? Can I fool a human witch? Not that with my mother it would be too hard, she was stuck on him and he ran. Well no it was more 'I just got this wonderful job over in New York but because of the role that I'm playing I can't have a lover and a child out of wed-lock, so it was nice knowing you, good-bye.'"
"I can't believe that! Owen would never-"
"Owen no, but he was just Puck pretending then, trying it out, getting the kinks out of the program." Robin sighed and folded his legs up underneath him. "And now he's Owen almost always. I miss my da." He said so quietly that Angela almost didn't hear him.
"Why don't you tell him that, my father and I had a problem like this once. He refused to acknowledge me as his daughter. But eventually we talked and he came to realize that even though I was a child of the clan, I was still his child as well."
"Oh yeah everything's just peachy for you and your da. You and yours, Alexander and his, those two little ones and theirs, just me and mine are out in left field." He paused and his eyes flashed, causing the gargoyle to lean back a little, "Besides it's his move. I came and opened the door, he's going to have to come on through." With that final pronouncement he turned his back on her and the castle, still hovering up in the air.
Angela stood out there watching his back for a moment before going back inside. Standing almost hidden in the doorway was Owen watching. He was far enough that he could have seen, but not hear their conversation. He held out his good hand stopping her.
"He's not coming in?" he asked, almost as flat as he usually talked. She shook her head no.
"He's waiting for you, I think, to come out."
"I see, thank you Miss Angela." He said, letting her arm go.
He watched her walk towards the wing that the clan used, before turning back to where his son hung. A slurping growling noise gathered his attention away from the doorway and back to the great hall. On the floor, quiet happily was Nudnik trying to tear apart one of Robin's boots.
Frowning he strode over to the garpup who looked up, with his tail wagging when he sensed Owen's presence. Owen reached down and grabbed the boot with a sharp tug.
"Give me that." He declared. The puppy let go, with a whine, and ran off before the human could do anything else. Pulling a handkerchief from his pocket he wiped off most of the slobber and collected the other boot that hadn't been attacked. Those in hand he walked slowly outside. Robin, if he noticed his presence, didn't acknowledge anything difference. "You should put these on." He said holding out the boots. The yellow-red hair youth turned his head, his red eyes glowing. His eyes landed on the boots and the glow dulled.
"Oh." He said with a shrug.
"Would you please put them on?"
"Alright." He said with another shrug. He unfolded his legs and landed lightly on the stone. Not looking at his father he took the boots and sat down on the ground pulling them on. Owen stared down at him. He looked back up. "What?"
"Nothing." He said, but really meant something. "Your mother-"
"Is in jail, a whore, and I don't want to talk about her." Robin snapped.
"Then what do you want to talk about?"
Robin seemed stunned by the question. "Huh?"
"It seems rather obvious." The halfling stared at him for a long moment and then chuckled. The chuckling turned in a full out laughing fit. Owen watched him with a blank face as Robin gasped for breath between cackles. "May I ask what you find so amusing?"
"Nothing, nothing..." he gasped out.
"Obviously it must be something." Robin smiled.
"You used to say that when you asked me to do something and I said I didn't understand just to get out of it. You'd then turn to into Puck and tickle me till I'd said I did understand." He sighed and stood up brushing off his knees a finger getting caught in the hole in the left leg. His face turned wistful. "I miss that. Having you and your other you was the greatest secret in the world. What happened da?"
"I tried to avoid a responsibility and was punished for it."
"To be Owen for ever?"
"And banished from Avalon."
"Oh." He tried to sound sympathetic but having never been there, having only heard about it from stories, couldn't understand Owen/Puck's loss. "And now you're stuck, that's one heck of a punishment."
"It is a lesson I will never forget." He deadpanned. His son glanced at him and grinned, "But it did come with responsibilities, responsibilities that I cannot avoid now."
"Do these avoidances include me?"
"I never meant to avoid you, and I did not forget you, there just wasn't any time and it wasn't in character..."
"Those sound like excuses." Robin accused his father and looked out across the sky.
"And I was afraid you didn't need me anymore. You had your mother and why would you want to be with some who was as stiff as me." Owen gave what would pass as a shrug for him. "Besides parenting scared me. It was not in my vast fey experience."
"Still excuses." He began to tick off things on his fingers, "First of course I needed you, you're my da! Second being a stiff doesn't refute your responsibility, especially with some one as flighty as mother. And third no one knows how to be a parent until they become one and I'm fairly sure they're all scared." He crossed his arms and stared defiantly waiting for a response.
"You're right." Owen finally responded. Robin's jaw dropped loosely.
"I am?" he asked in surprise.
"You are." He turned away as his son soaked this fact in. "Perhaps I can make amends, and we can try to start over?"
"I don't think we can start over, that would involve time travel and some other tricky stuff, but" he continued on a more serious note, "I'd be willing to continue from here and see what happens."
"That is also acceptable, but perhaps you would like a shower first?" Owen said wrinkling his nose slightly in disgust at the state of Robin's clothes that had progressed from shabby to tattered. Robin glanced down at himself and shrugged.
"Sure okay, and something to eat too?" He asked with a grin. The father looked at his son with a raised eyebrow. Then with out a word, his face with only a crack of the slightest wisp of a smile, Owen took Robin inside by the elbow to see what Broadway was cooking up.