'That name really sucks. It's just the word octopus shortened; why would I want to be called Octo? That's like naming your child Hum, short for human. Huso and I are going to have a long chat on how to properly name someone.'
Back to Huso, he got his first three props ready to go for the first half of the performance. It was a stick, a tablecloth, and blank. He stood on top of a box to gather the passerby's attention. He cleared his throat and spoke.
"Hello, Audience, I am Huso the clown. Today is my first performance here. I will be doing a series of different acts, so please enjoy."
What he said didn't actually gather a crowd, but it let everyone know he was performing, and it did get some people's attention. He seemed a little nervous, but he put on a faux smile and carried on with the show.
'Great job so far Huso'
The plan was deviously clever. The first act he would do would be a very flashy and eye-catching trick to draw in an initial interest. From there, he can just do whatever tricks and gags come naturally next. We had a few highlight tricks he would do if he felt interest started waning, but that was for later; right now was time for my first role to play, the color-changing ball.
"My first act will be juggling, but I doubt you have seen juggling like this before."
Huso then pulled out 3 balls all the same color, grey, a more boring color, but it has its use here. He then threw all three of them into the air and began doing a simple juggle.
"I know everyone here has seen this trick, but have you seen this?"
He then threw one arm behind his back and began throwing the balls into the air towards his head. The 5 or 6 spectators were confused about what he was doing. They had seen a one-handed juggle before; it's not an incredibly advanced trick, but they couldn't comprehend why he was throwing the balls toward his head.
As the balls were about to hit his head, he bounced the balls off his hat and back into the air back to his hand, and all the spectators audibly gasped in surprise. The way this trick worked was that he would send the balls up, and Huso would nod his head with enough force to send the balls back up. Naturally, this wouldn't be feasible as the precious and dexterity required would be too much for only your head, but with me here, I can alter the direction and give the balls a bit more oomph to carry them over.
Huso and I practiced the coordination between us for this trick more than actually juggling, as my practice with morphing and body control had already prepared me for juggling.
The spectators were enamored by the spectacle. It was so unique and different from what their minds had expected that they just couldn't look away, and it started to draw a larger crowd rapidly.
"You haven't seen anything yet, folks."
Then his head started knocking the balls up to the right away from his hand. He then side-stepped to the right, following the balls and knocking them back to the left, and thus began juggling the balls with nothing but his head.
This part was done just like the last one, where I control the direction and force of each ball from atop his head. This time, the now very large crowd was flipping out over this act; people started shouting and cheering. After a few seconds of this bizarre kind of juggling, Huso stopped and caught all the balls with his hand. The audience of now 30 people circling him began clapping and cheering for this.
"Thank you, thank you, you are all too kind."
Huso then pulled out one large hoop and raised it over his head. He smiled at the crowd and began spinning the hoop around his torso.
"My next act will involve all you wonderful folks. I have this fun ring here that I want all of you to choose where on my body it will move to. Don't be shy, it can be anywhere, although some spots might be more awkward than others."
That line got a few chuckles from the audience, and the more eager members of the audience started giving some requests. The first request came from a grown man sipping a coffee. "Head!" Huso then started moving the hoop slowly up his body, past his arms, and up to his neck. Then he quickly squatted down and used his nose to push the hoop up, spinning it around his forehead, yet still smiling just like before. It was getting a little hard to stay on his head, so I had to tighten my grip.
"Where to next?"
Immediately, a very short lady shouts out, "Right foot!"
"Really not making this easy for me? I'll make it a little more interesting."
He then carefully pulled out a second hoop from beside him while still spinning the other one. He then catches the hoop on his head and transfers it to his left arm, still spinning. He then began spinning the other hoop on his right arm in sync with the other hoop. He then threw the hoop on his right arm into the air and caught it with his right leg, standing only on his left leg.
"Now, let's make this even more difficult. Want to see me do it with both legs?"
Without a pause, he threw the hoop in his left arm high into the air, and he slowly started leaning forward and caught himself in a handstand. He then caught the hoop in the air with his left leg. He was now spinning both hoops on both legs upside down. The audience was mesmerized by this jaw-dropping performance. He rolled back to standing and bowed to the now large crowd.
"We are just starting, folks, we have a long day ahead of us."
'This is surprisingly fun. I just wish I had a better view. Preferably one without bald spots.'
...
Back to Meira and her new underling, Oscar. They had been reviewing every performer officially invited to attend, but before going on a trip to each one, they were first going to interview Miss Vattelle. She was currently being treated in the medical office after she was attacked by Precious. Oscar and Meira entered the medical center and saw one lone nurse sitting at a desk with two doors directly behind her. They both walked up to her.
Meira spoke up first, "Excuse me, nurse, we are looking for Vattelle. She was a dancer for last night's party. Is she here?"
"Oh, Miss Vattelle is resting in room 1, right this way."
The nurse stood up and escorted them through the door on her left, which led to a hallway with three doors on both sides, all numbered from 1 to 6. They entered the first door while the nurse kept talking.
We mostly expected drunks to come in here, so we were surprised to get a victim of Precious last night. Oscar felt a little scared that Precious's attacks were treated so commonly here; he remembered his time with that creature.
"Don't let Father hear you saying that about his favorite dog," Meira said coldly.
"Yes, young miss."
As they entered the room, they saw Vattelle covered in large claw marks and bruises all over her body. She tried sitting up, but the cast on her foot and the weakness in her body kept her down. Oscar pulled two chairs over so he and Meira could sit down while Meira was holding onto her clipboard with a few prepared questions on it. He then asked Vattelle the first of many questions.
"Don't move, we are just here to ask you a few questions. First, your name is Vattelle?"
Vattelle relaxed a bit and answered, "Yes, I am Vattelle of the Thunder sisters, who wants to know."
"I am Oscar, and this is Lady Meira of House Roslin. We came by hoping to find out what you know about a problem we are looking into. Tell me, why were you attacked by the dog?"
Vattelle looked very confused at this question and annoyed as well.
"Why would I know the reason that beast attacked me? All I know is that I was trying to leave the party, and I was randomly attacked by that creature."
"They found a small tentacle in your pocket. Can you tell us where you got it?"
"I never had anything in my pockets, much less a whatever you called it. Someone must have slipped that thing into my pocket at the party."
"Well then, please write down every person you talked to at the party. Please don't leave anyone out."
Meira, looking a little baffled, pulls Oscar to the side and asks him something.
"Why are you so good at this? I can understand figuring out it was one of the performers, that's a reasonable deduction, but you are too good at handling this, so what's the deal?"
Honest Oscar was a little taken aback by the emotion he had seen on Meira's face here; she had only shown cold calculation, so seeing this side of her is kind of... cute.
"Why is this so important to you?"
"I just want to know who I'm working with."
Oscar sighs, "It's nothing too special. My dad was an investigator for the Bureau, and he would show me stuff when I was younger, wanted me to be one too. It's not that big a deal."
"Then why are you a bottomer with my dad instead of an investigator too?"
After a long pause and heavy eye contact, Oscar finally answered.
"My dad died when I turned 13, and my mom needed money, so I started bottoming, and while at a pub for bottomers looking for work, I met your dad, we hit it off, and I joined his crew as a gutter. There's my crybaby backstory, you happy?"
Meira looked a little sad at what she heard. She felt bad for bringing up his dead dad to him.
"I-I'm sorry I didn't mean to bring it up-"
"nah, it's fine, you were just curious, and it's all in the past anyway, no need to beat yourself up about it," Oscar said with a fake smile.
Before she could respond, Vattelle was done writing her list, so they walked back over to her. They grabbed the clipboard from her and read it over, and what they saw shocked them.
"Why are there over a 100 names on this list?"
"Well, you wanted everyone that night, right? There were a lot of important people there, so me and the girls wanted to network."
Oscar was quickly realizing that he had signed up for a much larger task than he originally thought.
...
Huso was running behind me, chasing after me. why was he doing that, might you ask? Well, the reason is I'm BEING KIDNAPPED AGAIN.