It'd been a few days since the two gembound had come out of their chrysalises. Anne was first, of course, and she wasn't afraid to let her younger brother know it. Their mother had tried her best and was perfectly servicable, of course, but it didn't stop her newborn children from being absolute menaces.

The lights had dimmed out hours ago, though Anne was still awake. She intentionally waited until mother was busy with the forge before she invaded Oskar's side of camp, barrelling in with long, skinny legs and fat arms flailing, tussling around the bedroll where he was trying to sleep.

For no reason, of course, other than she felt like torturing her sibling today.

"All you do is SLEEP!" She bemoaned, cloven hooves kicking in the air as she tried to coordinate her spidery limbs to pull herself upright again. "Why were you born if all you do is go back to sleep?"

It did not matter, incidentally, how much or how little Oskar had slept as of late. He was sleeping now, and that was a point of contention that Anne could use in whichever war they were waging on each other.

@Oskar

Oskar hadn't been sleeping that much. Well, admittedly he hadn't slept much the night before and was now paying for it. A fact which didn't lessen the grumpy mood he awoke in as he was bombarded by his sister. Squawking indignantly as he tussled with the tangle of limbs in return.

"I wasn't sleeping! I was just being COMFY!" The few seconds younger sibling cried in outrage. Although he had been sleeping. He didn't need Anne to know that; he had to be cool. Chunky little lizard limbs batted his sister alongside thick little childish arms.

"Why were YOU born?" Oskar snapped back with a deep scowl. He made the mistake of forgetting to lower his voice before continuing his no doubt debilitating comeback, "all you do is be STINKY!"

@Anne

"No!" Anne squealed, which was about the best thing she could think to do in that moment. When he batted at her, she crumpled like a soccer player that had received a light pat to the shoulder, curling in on herself like she'd sustained a life-threatening injury.

"I was born because mummy loves me and she DOESN'T LOVE YOU!!" She was on her back now like an upturned turtle, her stupid limbs too long and gangly to immediately right herself. Her fore-shin whacked Oskar in the face as she wriggled. "You're just big and stupid and-- and-- stupid!"

Truly a poet of our generation.

If there was a Christ, Dip would have sworn on him.

It'd been a very productive eight minutes of hammering into a red-hot steel blade, shaping it slowly, when her children began fighting. This hadn't been a problem with Shiloh, but Shiloh was an only child. Perhaps Dip had made a mistake in trying to supply a kid with friends their own age.

Thank goodness the third chrysalis hadn't broken open yet.

She let them tussle for a time (it was good, wasn't it, to let them find their own boundaries?) but the line was drawn when Anne began squealing and bullying Oskar. Or, bullying him more than usual. "That's enough," came Stern Mother Voice as she marched over, picking up both children by the scruffs of their necks and prying them away from each other. "You can't be unkind to each other. Say you're sorry for calling your sister stinky," she said to Oskar. To Anne, she said, "and say you're sorry for telling lies to hurt your brother's feelings."

Oskar gaped up at Dip as he was accused of this.. this.. crime! Yes, he had done it, but that he was being asked to apologise? As if he were the guilty one? Unbelievable! Unacceptable! And Mummy had to love him, surely. Right?

Instead, he settled for scrambling to his own feet and blowing a big, fat raspberry at Anne. "But she started it! An- And! She said you don't love me! And I was born because you love me too!" He complained loudly; he tried to stamp his little feet but being scruffed meant it was little more than a kick in the air, which made him sway slightly.

"And! And! She doesn't even play doctor right! She always tries to amputate when it only needs a plaster!" He continued, growing only louder in volume. Whether the accusation was true or not is hard to know. After all, neither of them is a doctor, and they are, in fact, children playing pretend. But grievance is aired all the same.

He doesn't refute being stupid. Most likely unintentionally.

@Anne

"IT GETS INFECTED!!!" Anne screamed indignantly, flailing around in Dip's fist. "You can't put a plaster on something that gets infected, you have to cut the whole leg off!! You just want Sparklesnap to be sore forever because you're STUPID!"

Another violent wriggle before Anne thrust her tiny arm out to Dip. "And! He hit me! So I'm not going to say sorry!" He didn't, of course-- or, at least, he hadn't out of nowhere. There wasn't even really a mark on Anne's arm as proof.

Dip closed her eyes and tried to dissociate. She'd made those stupid rainbow-coloured horses to keep them entertained and have something to play with, but if she'd known they'd like to play amputation and dysentery with them, she probably wouldn't have bothered and let them play with rocks like every other kid.

"Did you hit her?" Dip asked Oskar tiredly. Then, she addressed Anne again. "Since you started it, you say sorry first. You have to be nice to people, including your brother, or else everyone will think you're nasty and not want to play with you."

She gave the kids a light shake; not hard. She just wanted to get some sense into their tiny, days-old heads. "Neither of you want to be stuck with no one to play with, right?"

@Oskar

Well, Mother certainly made a compelling point. Except for the hitting part, he didn't do that. "I didn't even hit her!" He protested with a huff.

But, he did want someone to play with, and Mummy didn't understand the deep intricacies of dysentery and always said 'they could get better' as if that was a compelling story at all! Ugh. The thought made him even grumpier, and he was still nursing his wounded pride from being woken up.

"_{I'm... sorry}." Oskar mumbled out of the corner of his mouth, not looking at either Dip or Anne. His gaze instead lingered on a corner of the cave that had become very interesting all of a sudden.

"But she did call me stupid!" He reiterated, much louder, as if they'd forgotten in those few seconds between.

@Anne