As his sister claimed the right to speak, [but waited before using it] Vandal grinned mischievously for a moment and watched her silently, trying to read her expression. He felt a pit form in his chest as the silence dragged on for a few seconds, but he resisted the urge to speak, compelled to reserve her right to continue speaking. The dusty atmosphere only made the pause feel more lengthy as particles of dust danced around the two, dully illuminated by the distant lights which Vandal left untouched.

The pause ended, relieving the pit in Vandal’s chest, as Vi continued with a proposition. To his surprise, he didn’t have any immediate objection to her idea. All he knew about school was based off the ringmaster’s description. [i]It’s not that I don’t trust him,[/i] he thought, shaking a few dark thoughts from his mind as he inhaled, preparing to speak. “You’re right about the air,” he started, fanning the space in front of his face with his hand, resulting in a flurry of dust, “but we better ask the ringmaster before wandering off. We don’t want to get lost again,” he said, another sly smile spreading across his face as he walked towards the stage entrance door and recounted the farcical episode he alluded to.

[hider=Without Puppeteering]
[If you don’t agree with or like this story, I’ll trash it. The following events take place about nine years prior, when they are around 8 years old]
Vandal and Vi waved goodbye to the muscleman as they speed walked down the street. “I don’t think they’ve ever let us roam free in a city before,” Vandal pointed out, excitement exuding from his every word. Vi agreed and followed along as they made their way down the sidewalk, looking around in search for the grocery store.

Vandal spotted an interesting-looking sign and waved for Vi to follow him inside. “This doesn’t look like a grocery store,” she commented, looking through the window. Inside, she saw plenty of books and colorful boxes lined up along shelves, with a single person standing behind a desk near the door. “That’s because it isn’t a grocery store – it’s a book store!” Vandal then rushed into the store, dragging Vi along behind him.

“We should just get the food and go back, we don’t want to be out on our own for too long,” Vi whispered, looking around the shop nervously. Vandal pridefully smacked his chest, then quickly responded, “you need not fear, Vandal the brave is here!” He then chuckled and pulled a book off the shelf, saying, “besides, I already found the book I want.”

Vi looked at the book for a moment and instantly frowned, unamused. She grabbed the book out of his hand and placing it back on the shelf with a sigh, saying, “we don’t have a chess board, and you’re just going to use that book as leverage to get him to buy you one.” Vandal growled in disappointment, more so that she saw through his scheme than her disapproval, then looked out of the corner of his eye to see the most glorious of words.

Instantly, Vandal jumped over to the shelf, climbing two rows upwards to grab a thick book from the top row, and hopped back down. Vi stared at him in shock and asked what he found, then he showed her. “This is the best book ever conceived by man! It’s Arglonaught’s 500, the best anthology of combat and warfare strategies ever produced! He uses chess and martial arts to explain how…” Vandal was then interrupted by Vi as she asked, “that’s cool, but how much is it?”

Vandal paused, then looked at her in confusion, unable to shift his train of thought fast enough to translate her words. “What did you say?” he asked, to which she replied, “how much does it cost?” Vandal took the book over to the guy at the front counter and asked, and he replied, “Two hundred bucks, sonny. That one’s from my grandpa’s prized collection. Good eye, though.” With a disheartened frown, Vandal walked towards the exit of the shop, and Vi followed.

After a half hour of walking, Vi asked, “hey, Vandal, shouldn’t we have found the grocery store by now? Mr. Muscles said that we would find it in no time if we kept looking left.” Vandal looked around, alarmed by her concern and nodded in agreement, saying, “you’re right, we should turn back and look around. Maybe he meant to turn left, then we’d see it.”

The two then turned around a corner, walking through an alleyway and onto the sidewalk of another street, and continued walking for another ten minutes. After this, Vandal started to get worried. “Alright, we took a wrong turn somewhere,” he said, looking back at Vi, “do you remember where we came from?” As he said this, a few men turned the corner in front of him and one of them bumped into him. The gargantuan fellow angrily exclaimed, “watch where yer goin’ kid!” and continued on his way as the two nearly jumped out of their skin.

Vandal then quickly grabbed Vi’s arm and turned around the corner, saying, “never mind, we can find our way back. We took more lefts than rights, so if we head this way we should be on the right track.” Vi nodded, trusting her brother’s intuition due to the looming possibility of what could happen if he was wrong. She quickly took her arm back, however, and followed him at a brisk pace, keeping up with him as he turned corners.

Five more minutes later, the two were even more lost than before. Giant buildings loomed overhead, and the only two ways they could see was up and down the street they were on. Vandal gritted his teeth in frustration and stopped for a moment, looking around to get his bearings. “I think I saw that street sign before, but I don’t know which way we were going when we got here,” he said, trying to keep a calm expression. Vi took a deep breath and declared that they were obviously lost.

About two hours after they first set off in the city, a few of the carnies set off into the city to look for the two, suspecting something was wrong. Vandal used his book smarts and convinced Vi that they needed to stay put instead of moving around so that it would be easier for the others to find them. Unfortunately, when two police officers walked by and started asking them questions, Vandal interpreted it as a bad sign and the two ran off.

The carnies didn’t manage to find the two until the next day, in supermarket on the opposite side of the city, sleeping on couches in the furniture section. The employees called the police, who happened to be talking to the ringleader at the time of the call. After a few interesting conversations, the two safely made it back to the carnival and were strictly reprimanded through chores and performance practice. Needless to say, neither of them were eager to wander around in any city for some time after.
[/hider]

After reaching the door he held it open for his sister with a more sincere smile, then followed her over to the ringleader. [who I don’t know how to name or describe]