:,a different perspective.;

[cosmos.;]

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[cosmos.;]

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xx

- the start -
- footnotes -
- the beach -
- the front -
- arguments -
- the streets -
- the rain -
- another try -
- detective -
- the end -

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┌═════════════┐

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Author's note,
Authors' note.

Yeah, yeah. Anyways years
have passed since this.
You'll find us stealing stuff
from your staffroom now.
And back at the mansion.

See you, D.

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└═════════════┘

x
x

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[cosmos.;]

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┘

There was once a mansion by the seaside.

Fresh, salty air; chalky, endless beaches, and
a sea filled to the brim with mysteries that
no one but we would know about. We loved
it. Anyone who didn't run away at the sight
of a two-headed, fanged kalon joined our
little team of who could send seagulls into
the sky fastest, and ended up with a coat
saltier than Ray by sundown. When we
went home, we had a quick bath and a
few hours of homeschooling with the rest
of the family until we gave up. Lastly,
we read books, two at a time. Ray held his
science fiction and fantasy over on the
right, whereas I tended to take the
encyclopedia and newspapers on the left.

But we could both be individuals, yet
get along as a pair. Contrary to what
some believed, we were actually
quite similar. (Somewhat) smart,
sociable and rule-breakers. Curfew
might’ve been at 8, but we wouldn't
shut up until 9, talking about what
we'd read. It was never anything
studious, but that's why it was fun.

We were a household of 6, or 10 as I might
have said. The point is, we had a strange family.
A quadruplet of two-headed siblings (from
two parents who never turned up to be parents
in the first place) living with 2 kind seniors were
kind enough to adopt us 'little monsters'. But as
Rue didn't say, we didn't feel like we needed to
play indoors and 'bond' with our family as we
knew them to be. There were plenty of people
who came to visit our beach, plenty of people
to play with, and plenty of things to scavenge
from them. And even if there somehow wasn't,
the nearby town had plenty of interesting
places to visit.

Our family? We had the typical older sister,
named Evelyn in this case, who was somehow
put in charge of the house, and her brother
Lin, who would've been better off being her
opposite, tended to be boring and complacent.
We did have another two sister, but we didn't
have a memory that large for them. Rue might
call me salty and mean, but that's how it was
in our world. If you can't hold our attention
for more than 2 seconds, screw you, bye.

And then there was Dani.

Dani was probably the nicest one
in the family. Whereas Evelyn and Lin
were the most mature, we were the
loudest, and, well, our other siblings
were themselves, Dani never spoke up.
Half of her was selectively mute, and
the other half seemed like she wanted
to be. Both tended to be pretty chill.
As in usually cold and asocial.

I suppose you could say I started it.
We were alone on the beach that day,
with Rue out of rock or sand facts
to burn into my brain, me out of things
to burn, and no seagulls in sight. We
were bored, for the once, so we tried
to sleep. I tried to sleep. Rue wouldn't
stay still, and was staring at people
who passed by very creepily.

"Now that you've finished the game, go back to-"

"Whence you came - it's the lighthouse." Ray blurted out, remembering the line
which had caused him to squeal as a 4 year old. "No offence, but you're a little
late for that scavenger hunt. By 7 years. The company went bankrupt, and the
prize was a chocolate bottle given to the store manager's daughter. Not even any
cookies for the riddle writer. No dignity whatsoever - I'm glad they left."

"Oh, I didn't realize someone actually entered apart from us. I was just reliving
old memories. It's been the only interesting thing out for those years. No offence.
Life just feels pointless sometimes." the stranger sighed and sat.

"Hey, do you not talk to anyone around here? It's a great way to be in stories other
than the ones you read. And it's also a great way to get new books. I would know,
since I'm the one who gets them for you and our family."

"Ray?"

“And if it’s rhymes you like to see, why not just come to me?” Rue grinned and
continued. “Ray's taken a shiny silver fork, from the only restaurant which serves
decent pork. But if you'd like to see it return, we'd be happy to help you learn
how to solve problems with your mind, and use your knowledge to be kind.”

"...She's still practicing." Ray added when neither of the heads responded.

“No, I never knew you were so into rhyming! And with perfect timing, is
it the one with the fancy fonts, the one that's called the Seaside Front?” Dani
managed to meet Rue's riddle with one of her own, literally surprising and
slightly shocking herself.

The right head groaned whilst the left laughed and refused him a facepalm.
"Great, someone else who seems to think rhymes and fancy fonts are the holy
grail of literature." Ray grinned as he forced himself and Rue up. "Come on
then, you figured it out. You're coming with us to return it and bail me out
of trouble."

"Excuse you, my excuses are good enough and have excused you from many
inexcusable situations. Even the inexcusable teaching methods of-"

"Come on. Before Rue teaches any more Dr Seuss."



The trio walked down the beach, rhyming and laughing.

[cosmos.;]

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┘

I was more creative than Ray, a
lot of the time. And I still am. If it
wasn't for me, Ray probably would've
gotten caught quite a lot. I would’ve
gotten into art, but that wouldn’t
have been good with a brother who
burned more than he built. Both
metaphorically and physically.

Rue had great ideas back in
the day, and had to save me a lot.
But since Dani joined, the two were
working more like a team and could
come up with an action movie plot
in 5 sentences. Not always a good
plot, mind you. We didn't always
turn out to be good guys.

"So you say you just found one of our vintage spoons, with our brand name all over it,
lying on the beach. You then picked it up, missing both brandings even though they
were on both sides, and promptly forgot about it for a week.”

“Well, sir, I wouldn’t say we promptly forgot. It was-”

“We did find it a month ago, but we spent the majority of our time trying to track
down the culprit. We figured it would please you a lot more if you had the thief
here with you. And we did get given a crime kit for our birthday a month ago.” Rue
cut in with a lie barely better than the one Ray had told.

“And when we did eventually find the thief, he attacked us. Rue and Ray were in a
coma for a week whilst I got amnesia for a few days. And I couldn’t go on without
them.” Dani added, taking inspiration from a current news title. It still didn’t sound
believable.

“Oh, the poor children. Come on dear, they did bring one back. Let them have a
meal.” The co-owner, the owner’s wife promptly came in. “They look starved.”

“They’re hellhounds, they’re always starved.” The owner failed to whisper
quietly enough, leaving Rue and Ray trying not to glare. When the wife didn’t
respond, he followed up with, “Alright, fine. Here’s the menu. Don’t let your
brother or sister, whatever they are, steal it, and don’t take too long to order!”
before storming into the kitchen.

“Would one of you mind explaining the rest to me, since my husband’s being
a bother with the details? Your carers are great regulars, and I doubt their
son would steal anything of ours.”

“Sure, just give me a second.” Dani perked up first, then turned around to us.
“If you hear screaming, run to the lighthouse. I’ll be fine. In the meantime,
pick a meal for us. I don’t mind anything. Just pick something that we can all
agree on.” The pastel kit leapt off the chair and ran over to the staffroom,
leaving the two heads to talk.

This is where it started to go wrong.

Maybe if Dani had said ‘you two’, instead
of ‘we’, it would’ve been fine. But we’d
never been exposed to more than one
other person in our group, and we were
both trying to build a real friendship with
her. And we both saw a different ‘her’.
It’s hard to describe with words, but in
that moment I started to doubt 'us'.

Maybe rhyming isn’t the holy grail
of literature, but you really do have to
pick your words if you’re around a duo
who were raised with books. ‘We’ now
meant a trio of Rue, Ray and Dani. And
we generally supported anyone who
wasn't as lucky. But that had only been
in stories.

“Let’s get the pork supreme.” Ray jumped in for the most filling yet most unhealthy.
It was usually the favorite, but they’d never put another person into the equation.

“Isn’t that too much for us three?”

“We're two heads, and therefore we have two mouths. With fangs. So if you aren’t
eating it, I am. We aren’t about to waste this free meal on a salad. This is the only
good restaurant for miles.”

“Well, maybe it’ll make us less healthy, if we have to finish, we pretty much have
to be burned to lose those calories.”

“What is with you today? We’ve been having meals far less healthy than this for
years, and we’re still stuck looking like kindergartners! Maybe we should take
this as a sign that we should grow up.”

“Well, maybe we should take growing up as a sign that we should be caring about
for others more. Dani doesn’t spend her days as we do, and we probably shouldn’t be
giving her a meal completely made of pigs. You can’t just consider ourselves here.”

The two heads started growling at each other, putting some off their meal.
Neither were able to say or do anything else until the staffroom door opened.

“Alright, alright. Double fish and chips should be good enough for a free meal
for us three. We promised that we wouldn’t do this in public.”

"Chips and fish, what a nice dish! You two ready for this?"



"Oh. Right. Food. Yeah."

[cosmos.;]

┌xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx┐
I want red! But I want gray!
We should steal! Or we should pay?
Differences so small and big.
Became arguments night and day.

We tried out best not to be cliché,
But we just went more and more astray,
Leaving our childhood in the beaches,
We packed up and ran away.
└xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx┘

[cosmos.;]

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┘

“Where are we going today? Where would be a nice place to move away?”

Since 4 years or so had passed, our carers
had passed away, and our whole family was
stuck wondering what to do. 4 of us weren’t
planning to do anything with it, and we took
that as a bad sign, so we decided to move
away soon after the funeral, taking our books
and belongings. We don’t regret it - it was
destined to happen with how much we were
outside it.

Evelyn and Lin were left in control of the
house, but we had no idea how long they
would keep that control. Not that there would
be anything like an uprising of maids, but in
what state would they would move on
themselves? I made a mental note to go back
there someday, just to see what happened.
In the meantime, we were planning to get
our own jobs.

We’d mostly forgotten the restaurant fiasco
by this time, especially since it had been around
4 years or so since that day. But we had been
arguing a lot more commonly, and going outside
further than the beach into this little town next
to it. There was nothing to do there, of course,
but I suppose we just left it behind sometimes,
and we would leave it behind again.

We’d also heard a lot of good things about cities
growing up, and how they tended to have better
job opportunities and such. So it seemed like a
good idea at the time. We’d planned everything
at childhood - we’d either have two jobs
throughout the day or find one we could both be
satisfied with, and the second one didn’t seem
too bad. Still better than a someone who just
turned on a light, or 'saved' people from sharks.

“Oh, just on the coach, anywhere away from the coast.”

“That doesn’t count as a proper rhyme, and you should feel ashamed for trying to
make it work.” Ray tried for humor, and not at the right time.

“It’s been ages since you’ve made anything that works yourself.” Rue pointed out in a
rather mean voice. “The last telescope you made burned down half our shelves. My half
of the shelves.”

“You’re welcome for a lighter bag. I don’t know how you managed to put so much stuff
in here.” Ray noted, sounding sterner himself.

“Let’s focus on the coach, as of now.” Rue sighed and forced up both their arms to help
their sister load the bags, before the argument went any further.

---

“Thank you. Would you happen to know if there is any housing available around here?”
Dani asked the bus driver as she was the last one getting out, as the other two waited
anxiously on the pavement. “For a couple of newcomers to this area.”

“There’s a couple of decent houses down that lane for cheap, but you’ll need a job to
keep them. Take a look a couple of newspapers, you might want to start with this one.
I’m sorry to hear that you three’s carers have died, and I can’t do much about them.
They were a good couple. I'm glad I can give their kids a start in life. Good luck.”

“Thank you.” Dani repeated. It was clear nobody wanted to continue that conversation
at the time.

---

“Yes, I suppose I could grant you all a room tonight. Your funds should be able to cover a
few nights if you need. I’ll leave you two- four? to it.” the houseowner took a couple
hundred dollars off the trio and left them to the room.

Could it even count as a room?

The paint was peeling off the walls in little segments onto the floor, which had planks
sticking up like uncombed hair. The only piece of furniture was a sink and toilet in the
corner along with a table in the middle of the room which had been graffiti-ed over
many times. It seemed larger than we were, naturally leading to one of the more
creative ideas thought of during that time.

“We call top bunk, I guess?” Rue asked, and set up the sleeping bag on the table along
with the newspapers.

“Hold on, what are we going to eat tonight? Fish and chips for lunch is not going to
sustain us until tomorrow.” Ray butted in as his sister started reading the newspaper.
“And we’re going to need it soon, I think I’m beginning to lose my ability to read.”

“You lost that ability long ag-”

“I’ll go buy some things from the supermarket and see what we can make. Stay put.”
Dani grabbed one of the newspapers and headed out the door, leaving the twins to skim
through the remaining papers until they simply gave up and slept.

We slept.

We should've stayed sleeping.

[cosmos.;]

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┘

It was raining heavily, and I was half
asleep at 12am. Our room was clunky but
the roof kept us in and the rain out. We
hadn’t unpacked yet, spending the evening
skimming for jobs rather than reading the
books we used to enjoy. Half of them had
been burned, so we didn’t know what else
to do. But something else did happen that
night, something we should've expected.

It couldn’t exactly be counted as asleep.
Rue might’ve been able to deal with
hunger, but I couldn’t. I woke up to
the sound of questions from outside,
which vaguely sounded like someone
we knew. I nudged Rue at this point,
making us get up and look outside.

We then ran out the door, still in pajamas.

“Dani, what are you doing? Who’s the hell is this lady?”

“Never mind that! Did you actually buy the food?”

“Ray, for god’s sake, stop thinking with your stomach.”

“Stop it! We became friends because we could agree. I never minded what I got,
and you two were either helping me to choose or agreeing yourself. I don't know
what caused this between you two, but it's only been happening since I was here.
Now we're finally in a situation where we can all agree and be happy, even if it
results in us being split up. But for what it’s worth, this is better for all of us.”
Dani stopped to take a breath, on the verge of tears. “I’m sorry. But I don’t want
to ruin us all by coming between you two. Rue, you started off understanding
and relatable, but you’ve just become controlling and argumentative. Ray, you
were more realistic and witty, but just come off irritating to your sister and
more of a pessimist.”

"But Dani-"

"Ray, shut up. This is her moment."

"No, stop. I can't take any more of you two arguing. This is my moment, but it'll
be my last with you two. I just can't keep staying here if it keeps you two apart.
I went with you two because it made us all happy."

“Miss, I understand this may be-”

“No, it’s fine. I’d like to get to work, if you don’t mind. I’m sorry guys, I wish you
well. I just can’t take how much everything’s changed, and how bad the change is.
I’m going to follow my dreams, and make sure you can follow yours too. I was the
one who wrote the riddles for that scavenger hunt, and I’m going to solve many
more of them where I’m staying. Maybe I’ll even do better for what they’ll be
paying.” She sighed and got into the car, which engine started up.

"I guess this is goodbye, guys. I'm sorry for what I caused."



The rain kept pouring, but nobody moved.

[cosmos.;]

The rain was pouring as it always did, yet somewhat lighter.
Two adolescents and an adult sat down on sofas, the roof keeping
them far from outside.

“You two have skills in marketing and law?”

“In a way, yes. Rue’s been practicing her design for a while now.
She’s been making many volunteer posters and since we’ve been out
of college, studying loopholes with the law. I write the advertising
for said posters and have made sure they stay up, wherever they
were put. Here is one of them we made a while back for a certain
company that hosts scavenger hunts.”

The left head ducked down and held up one of the posters for the
man to see.

“I see. We’d like to see you back on Monday, if Rue will be able to
talk by then?”

“She should. Thank you, sir.”

---

The sun set, and night fell. The rain stopped, and it was finally
8:00pm. The two settled down for dinner, and the left spoke.

“Did we get the job?”

“You heard him. We ought to be back by Monday for you to talk.”

“You know what I meant.”

The right head sighed and handed her a few photocopied sheets.
“Yes. We’re one of the best employees and we’ve asked for a lot
lower pay than the others.

“Good. It’s been a long time since anything was normal. Pass the pork.”

"Don't remind me."

[cosmos.;]

“So who were Rue and Ray? Tell us about them, if you could?”

“I won't reveal too much about our origins, but I can say they were
both welcoming, smart and, well, loud. Ray leaned more towards a
pessimist, being a sarcastic yet charming thief. Rue was energetic,
creative and great with words. The two worked great together, and
generally with anyone else.”

“Generally? Why’d you leave them? They seem like a perfect partner for you.”

“On- Things changed. We all grew up and changed. Those two seemed
better off following their own dreams in marketing and law. They now
work for a certain company of sorts, which hosts interviews and such-”
the mute head silently gestured to the clock and whined. “If I may
point it out, it’s been 15 minutes.” she added.

“So it is! Well, ladies and gentlemen, our time with Dani is over. If
you’d like to submit any more guests to be on-” the interviewer’s voice
slowly trailed off as the crew stood to the side, grinning at the views
hey had pulled in.

“This is a huge success! Interviewing Dani has been one of the best
decisions this company has made since starting! You two, how did you
manage to bring her into the spotlight?”

The twins smiled sweetly, not yet ready to tell
the story which had changed them so much.

[cosmos.;]

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xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
We're Rue and Ray!
And we have paid,
Our respects to a friend,
Who left us one day.
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This was painfully fun? Good luck to
all, and I hope the winner finds as
much fun as I did in developing the kit <3

Images are from Google and are
edited by me. On another note
way too many words end in 'ay'.
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