Kipo shoved the door open, nearly collapsing inside as she passed through the threshold. She stumbled in, and someone, Kris, Kipo realized, caught her.

"Th-Thanks," Kipo mumbled, and to her relief, she could almost kind of hear herself now. Mira was right, this place really did seem to be better made than the houses. At the very least, Kipo was no longer worried about the ceiling collapsing on their heads.

"Oh, Kipo!" some one else, Luz, cried. "Are you alright? Your skin is... you're more red than pink right now."

"Yeah, I know," Kipo said, rubbing her forearm. She winced. "I'm fine."

Tulip gave her a look. "Are you... sure?"

"Does it look that bad?" Kipo asked, before shaking her head. "It doesn't matter. What's up with that storm, anyway?"

"It's insane!" Luz cried, flinching away as a flash lit of the room. Even though the windows were covered with curtains, the lightening outside was bright enough to over power the candle light in the room. "It's like the rain is out to kill us or something!"

"It wasn't this bad before..." Tulip noted. "There was a lot of rain last time but it wasn't as... well, destructive."

"It also seems to be getting worse," Mira added, just coming in. Kipo looked over, and her eyes widened. Despite herself, she felt her mouth curving up into a small smile.

Apparently, Mira had figure that the best way to get everyone quickly was to grab all of them at once, so now she, Kai, Anne, Mabel, Fei Fei and Coraline were crammed under one umbrella, awkwardly shuffling around.

Tulip chuckled. "Ah. So that's what was taking so long."

"It would've been easier if the umbrella was a little bigger," Mira huffed, and she held up the white umbrella so that it acted like a bridge between them and the door, so that each person could go in single file through the door. When every person was in except for Mira, she ducked in herself, closing the door behind her, and then attempting to close the umbrella. She frowned.

"Huh... It's not closing," she muttered. Kai blinked, and then walked over, silently taking away the umbrella from her and examining it. Mira let him, crossing her arms.

"Oh, it seems like the mechanism is broken," Kai eventually concluded. He was fumbling with something that Kipo couldn't see from where she was. "This wire right here... it snapped. See?"

Mira peered closing. "Hm, you're right. Can you fix it?"

"Hm..." Kai hummed thoughtfully as he carefully turned the umbrella over. "Well, I can try. But without the right tools I might just make it more brittle."

"Why would you bother to do that anyway?" Coraline called to them, sitting down at the table. "As long as it's open, it's doing its job, right? Just leave it."

Mira and Kai looked over to her, and simultaneously looked sheepish.

"Oh, yeah, good point," Mira realized. "Er... just set in down, Kai."

Despite looking a little disappointed, Kai did as she said, and they both walked into the dining room. Before Mira sat down, though, she paused, looking over to Kipo, who was standing on the side and clutching her arms tightly. Kipo bristled as she felt Mira's eyes on her, and was about to step forward before Mira held up a hand, stopping.

"Uh... wait, Kipo," Mira said. "You're dripping wet. We should get you a towel first."

Kipo paused, and then looked down at herself. Mira was right, of course, and not only that, but she was making a huge puddle on the floor.

"Oh," Kipo realized. "Oops."

Mira shook her head. "Just come with me."

Mabel perked up. "Oh? Where are you going?"

"The laundry room. It's in the basement."

"Ooh, I've never been there," Mabel said, getting up. Mira frowned at her.

"It... It's not that exciting," Mira tried to tell her, but Kris was already getting up, too. Mira blinked at them, and in the time that it took Mira to figure out what Kris was doing, Luz, Anne, Fei Fei and Kai were standing up, too. At Mira's questioning look, Anne just shrugged.

"Never been down there before," she told her, and Mira blanched.

"Never been down to the- why not?!"

"I never knew it existed!" Anne argued. "I've just been washing my clothes in the river!"

"I just don't want to be alone up here," Kai cut in, and Mira shook her head. Unfortunately for her, though, Tulip and Coraline had joined their group standing up as well.

"We might as well all go," Tulip said. She glanced at the ceiling, and as if on cue, a loud creaking echoed throughout the room. "It might actually be safer down there."

Mira stared up at the ceiling, frowning, before shaking her head.

"You're right," she agreed reluctantly, and grabbed a candle. She nodded to a door on the other side of the room, one Kipo hadn't noticed before. Like Anne, Kipo had no idea there had been a laundry room in this place, and had just been washing her clothes in the sink in her house. Technically, the real question was whether this laundry room was actually helpful or not. After all, they probably didn't have a washing machine, or anything like that, so was there really going to be any difference at all?

...Well, perhaps Kipo should just leave her judgement for when she actually saw the room.

Mira pushed open the door, and stepped through. Like lemmings, the rest of them followed her, but when Kipo's feet hit a shaky wooden step, she almost considered telling them to go back. She kept silent though, and with every new pair of feet, the steps swayed more and more, until Kipo was clutching the walls tightly for support. At any moment, she was certain that the steps were going to fall out from behind her, and she was going to be stuck hanging from the wall with her claws.

However, Mira, Kipo was impressed to see, never stopped, though she did waver quite a bit. Once, she knew was pitched off of the stairs and into the basement below, but she managed to catch herself just in time. Kipo was secretly glad for that, because right now, she couldn't feel her fingers with how hard she was hanging onto the wall and how cold she was. She was surprised she hadn't felt that before.

Suddenly, a loud bang sounded out from behind them, and Kipo jumped. However, this time, it wasn't thunder. Kipo could see from the candlelight Coraline was holding that the door behind them had swung close. Coraline turned around, ready to open it again, but Mira called out to her.

"Don't bother," Mira told her. "It doesn't stay open. But we're fine, we're almost at the bottom, anyway."

Kipo hummed, and when she looked down, she could see that Mira was right. However, there was a problem, and Kipo squinted at the ground, trying to make it out. But even with her eyesight, she could only see one thing: somehow, it looked like the ground was moving.

Kipo had realized Mira had begun moving again before she cried out, backing up onto the stairs again with a splash. All of the sudden, Kipo realized what the 'moving floor' meant. Water.

"The basement flooded!" Mira cried. She growled, annoyed. "Great, just great! Where's it even coming from?"

"I don't see anything," Kipo noted, scanning the room. She didn't really know what to look for anyway, though, she perhaps her trying was kind of moot. "Could be anywhere."

Mira sighed, shaking her head. "Well, the towels were hung up, anyway. I'm already wet, so I'll get them. Everyone else stay here."

"But hurry," Tulip told her. When Kipo looked back, she could see Tulip clutching the wall just as tightly as Kipo herself was. In fact, everyone seemed to be doing that. "I don't think these stairs are going to hold for much longer."

Mira nodded, and hurried down the rest of the steps. Just in time, apparently, because after she was off, someone behind Kipo started jumping up and down violently, making the stairs shake and groan with everyone else's cries of worry.

"Who's doing that?!" Anne yelped.

"Kris, cut it out!" Coraline shouted.

"The stairs are going to fall!" Kai cried, but he was wrong, because the stairs stayed intact, and Kris stopped jumping, looking all too pleased with themselves.

"That isn't funny, Kris," Kipo sighed, but just like usual, Kris didn't seem too worried about the ramifications of their actions.

"We can use these as blankets," Mira said, taking some of the towels. Well, not some, Kipo could see her grabbing each and ever towel within reach. "This place is probably the safest one around right now, so we'll sleep here and then figure out what to do in the morning. Kipo, you're already soaked, so come help me with this."

Kipo stepped of the stairs, and felt the freezing cold-water slap around her ankles, she cried out in surprise, before gritting her teeth and stepping forward. Water was always like that, right? She'd get used to it, she'd get used to it...

"Here." Mira held out some towels, and Kipo took them. She'd much prefer the warm blanket of her own bed, but, oh well. Mira glanced at all the ensembled people on the staircase. This is all that's down here, so you might as well go back up."

"I mean..." Anne started arguing, before shrugging. "Actually, no, you're right. This is boring. Let's go back up, Coraline."

Coraline rolled her eyes, but went up anyway with only minor grumbling. The other's followed her without argument, though Kris couldn't seem to be able to resist jumping up and down on the stairs again, but they weren't able to revel in it like before as Anne shoved them through the doorway. Still, they looked proud of themselves. Anne sighed.

"Are you sure you don't want any help, Mira?" Anne called down, stopping before she went through the door. Fei Fei paused behind her, also looking down.

Mira absentmindedly waved a hand over to them, and then nearly pitched over, underneath the weight of the towels. She managed to balance herself just in time, though, and Kipo caught the towels that had fallen.

"Er... we're fine," Mira said, sounding strained. "That's-That's probably enough, Kipo, let's go back up."

Kipo agreed, and Anne frowned that them. "Well, if you're sure, See you up there."

Anne and Fei Fei left through the door, and unfortunately, it closed behind them. Mira sighed.

"Right... I forgot about that," she sighed. "Well, we'll get there when we get there. First we got to get up the stairs."

Kipo agreed, and then they were braving the staircase, which felt more like an elaborate obstacle course than a stair well. If she focused closely, Kipo almost thought that the stairs underneath her were bowing down, and soon, Kipo was worried it snap under their weight.

Still, however bad Kipo had it, it was almost certainly worse for Mira. Because all of their hands were being used, there was nothing to hold the candle with. Of course, that didn't matter to Kipo, since her vision worked well no matter what, but she could see Mira was having trouble. They had set the candle down on the ground, in the water down there, and since it was one of those weird candles, it didn't go out, but the water seemed to be dimming its light.

Without that light, Mira obviously couldn't see very well, and though Kipo tried calling encouragement and helpful tips, Mira's eventual tip over was pretty much inevitable. Kipo winced as Mira fumbled, dropping the towels over the edge.

"Oh no!" Mira cried, but there was nothing she could do except watch as the towels fell down into the water with a splash. "Oh, come on!"

"Oh... Are you okay, Mira?" Kipo asked her. If she was honest, she wasn't really concerned about the towels. She didn't even think she needed it anymore, as she had spent so much time moving around that she felt completely dry now, warm even. Well, except for her feet, but she couldn't feel those anymore. "You're not hurt?"

"Just my pride," Mira grumbled. She nearly got up, but suddenly, something seemed to catch her eye. "Oh, there's an umbrella down there."

"Really?" Kipo shifted the towels around so she could peer down, too. "Huh. And there's a envelop in it, too."

"What?!" Mira leaned down farther, squinting down. "There is?! How do you... oh, right. I forgot you had superpowers."

"That's one thing to call them."

Mira hummed. "Well, we still need that umbrella. Hold on, I'll be right back."

"Don't fall again," Kipo warned her, and Mira glared at her playfully. A second later, Mira was coming up the stairs again, at first two at a time, and then much more slowly and carefully as the stairs threatened to tip her over.

"At least we don't need to worry about the door," Mira told her as Kipo as she passed her. Envelope and umbrella in hand, Mira pushed open the door, holding it open as Kipo walked in.

"You took a while," Tulip noted when they came in. She jerked her head at the door to the kitchen. "Anne started making food. It was called... well, I don't know, something from her parent's restaurant."

"Huh," Kipo said, thinking back. Anne had talked about her family restaurant often, so much so that Kipo figured she could picture it perfectly. And if any of Anne's past meals were anything to go on, then supper tonight was going to be delicious. "Yeah, I can smell it. It smells great, Anne!"

"You can smell it already?! I just started!"

Kipo chuckled. Anne sometimes forgot about Kipo's enhanced senses, too. In fact, most of them did. Well, other than Kris, who seemed hellbent on using them in their pranks against her.

"What's wrong?" Tulip asked, and Kipo frowned for a minute, thinking she was asking her, before she followed Tulip's gaze to Mira behind her. Kipo dumped the towels down on a chair, and then turned around to Mira, who had opened the envelope and was reading the letter inside with a troubled expression, her mouth pressed into a thin line and her eyebrows furrowed.

"Woah, what's that?" Kai asked, who seemed to have spotted Mira's expression, too. "Where'd you get it?"

"It's... I don't know," Mira answered, shaking her head. She held out the letter, which Kipo realized was yellow and faded, but it still somehow didn't look old. It looked new. "I don't know what it is. It's... I mean, you'll just have to read it yourself."