Heron Lake Plateau guiding light

It was really weird in its way that Eljay was sitting here readily admitting that the pups might need other teachers, other supervisors besides himself. It was weird to begin with that he would admit to not knowing everything! In Owen's experience, most adults tended to do just the opposite: they'd blather endlessly on and lord it over the younger generation how much smarter and better and wiser they were and that therefore puppies ought to do and believe everything exactly as that adult wished them to. Yet although it was nice of Eljay not to be operating off such a highfalutin' assumption, Owen wasn't quite sure he really wanted a different teacher, or that he was entirely ready to leave his beloved puppysitter behind. If you'd asked him that morning maybe he'd've insisted he was plenty ready to graduate, but now...? Owen's inability to do much about his suddenly-wayward sister Kite today had shaken him.

Literally, too. 'K- k- kay, he said to Eljay's suggestion of moving elsewhere and getting warmer. Warmer sounded awesome. Warmer sounded great. Right now he was pretty sure his bones were turning to ice though and that he would never ever be warm ever again. He scooted with alacrity in even closer to the puppysitter, leaning into the warmth and away from sister Phoebe's suspicious eyes over there... What mud glob? Had anyone else seen a mud glob? Why poor little shiversome Owen had no idea where such a thing might have come from, gee! (Phoebe in the meantime was pretty unconvinced and making her shadowy way around to her brother's far side, where she'd have a better line of sight on which to line up her own shot...)

'K- k- k- k- kay, he repeated himself to Kite, bobbing his head in obedient acquiescence to the smaller pup. Owen's rouged head moved rather jerkily as he tried to straighten it back up though, and so he amended this to, I'll t- t- try. Was he going to be able to stop shaking? Owen himself was getting a little concerned by how out of his control these shivers seemed to be getting, Eljay's and now Kite's gratefully shared body heat or not... This concern was not much helped as Kite herself voiced her worries to Eljay, that maybe her brother would end up with a permanent case of the uncontrollable shakies. The young boy's eyes widened in dismay at the thought. It seemed touching, almost humorous for Kite to be the one worrying about him but, well, Owen was worried about Owen now too, to be fair. What if he really wasn't able to stop the shivering? Would his body forget how to be warm if it went on too long? N- no, K- Kite, I d- d- don't think it works l- l- like th- that! Owen hastened to reassure her, but with growing panic rising in his own eyes his tremulous voice was less than convincing. Phoebe's eyes shifted from narrowed and vengeful to troubled as Owen's eyes met with hers for a moment over Kite's black back; Vasa on the other hand had come around to Eljay's other side where Owen couldn't see her, so who knew what she was thinking. Owen had seen cold puppies before, had been chilled himself previously, but never nearly this cold, he was certain... And who knew, maybe getting too cold for too long was what had happened to teeny tiny baby Kite herself once upon a time, back in that blind oh-so-long-ago murky past that none of them could quite remember just after being born! This really was a worrying notion, because Owen himself certainly didn't know of any other explanations for her difficulties that made any more sense than this. Though his imagination had always been a little too vividly creative for his own good.