Helluva Boss: ''Helluva Human Kid''

Ch.28 - Black-'Song'-Bird

Via lead Balin back to her bedroom for some more bonding time as babysitter-and-child. She then turned on the light to brighten up the room, and Balin was surprised to see for the first time how colourful it was.

"Sorry I had the lights off last time." said Via. "There's not a lot of that around here."

"I understand." replied Balin. "I mean, owls are nocturnal animals. Right?"

That little comment made Via laugh. "Oh, you are so cute!" she then picked him up and spun him around in a tight hug before flopping onto her bed.

She then closed the canopy drapes and crawled towards him on the bed like a predator.

"Come here, little one..." she sang, before lunging at him with tickles.

"HAHAHAHAHAHA!" laughed Balin. "Via! You're tickling my tummy!"

"Yes I am, little one! Yes, indeed!" the teenage owl princess cooed.

They both continued laughing as they spent a couple of minutes in a tickle fight.

Soon afterwards, Balin brought his backpack into Via's room and pulled out his favourite board game, 'Soggy Doggy', for them to play together.

The rules of the game were very simple for the two: each player had to race around the board and wash the plastic dog in a bathtub placed the middle of it, and if the soggy doggy shook the water off of him, it was back to the beginning.

Balin and Via sat on her bed cross-legged as they played three rounds, best out of three, over the next half an hour. The two each got a tie for the first two rounds, one player getting a go when the doggy shook the other one.

But soon, in a suspenseful couple of minutes of playing, Via finally won the final round of the game, making the dog shake Balin wet.

"Wahoo! Yeah!" she celebrated.

Looking a little wet but smiling warmly, Balin then clapped for Via's victory.

"Kid, why are you clapping for me?" she asked with laughter.

"Because you won the game, silly." replied the boy with his smile.

"Oh no, I don't need any praise." flushed Via modestly.

"It's okay. You still won, fair and square." Balin then crawled up to her and gave her a soft hug. "Just a hug for the winner then?"

"Awwww." Via then returned the hug, stroking his brown hair. "Quite the little hugging machine, aren't you?"

As the two let go, Via then said "My turn." and started giving Balin little kisses on his cheeks, his nose, and his forehead.

"There. Runner-up kisses from the princess." she smiled.

Feeling very grateful, Balin tried his hardest not to wipe the lipstick off his cheek, making Via laugh and rub his back.

"Thank you, sweetheart." she giggled softly. "I haven't had this much fun since I was your age."

"What did you do when I was 7?" the boy looked up and asked her with intrigue.

"Well, I went to this theme park with my dad when I was little, called Loo Loo Land, and..."

"That sounds like fun. Did you have fun?"

Balin then lowered his smile as he saw Via freeze traumatically, remembering a theme-park experience she spent years trying to forget. Feeling a little nervous for her, Balin called out her name a couple of times, but she seemed to be stuck in the flashback.

Seeing her tail feathers slowly wagging on the bed, he then started giving her feather scratches on her back to try and calm her down, the way he figured it'd work with Loona.