The long, cold season... [random]

There is enough to learn in one lifetime, Pip thinks clutching his cloak in a tight knot at his throat. He walks down a bustling London street, dodging the long legs of adult pedestrians and popping in and out of the shadows cast by old stone and bright yellow street lights. He ducks shopping bags that swing dangerously toward his head. So far, no one has noticed him - the art of dim affords him some protection from fragile eyes, but its a delicate balance - he cannot risk to dawdle, because the glamour isn't strong, and the longer some human idlely stares in his direction, the more distinct he becomes. So, head down, covered in a wool cap that hides his ears, he knuckles swiftly between the tall humans - they are dressed in black, primarily, and though he's been to London before, he's never seen such stiff shirts and so much underpadding. He must be somewhere in London's past, perhaps the eighteenth century, but the bustle and excitement is common to any era, at this time of year. He shakes his head sadly as a plump couple - he with a handlebar mustashe and she with gastly feathers peeking from her cap - almost roll him over, their arms burdened with an assortment of smart, crisp paper shopping bags, the names of stores emblazoned on their sides and, for a fearful moment, mere millimeters away from Pip's wide eyes.

So much to learn, he thinks, dodging the couple and darting down an alley. Quick as a flash he scales a drainpipe and is up, high above the busy street, standing on a roof. He sighs and inhales deeply - the smell is a mixture of the natural and the un; a hearty breath of winter cool with the sweet smells of Christmas cooking woven through. If he can help it, he always swings by London this time of year. It reminds him of mortality; Pip, having never been born, has no fear of dying, but is fascinated by the subject. Human seem to be the most interesting case study - so much of their lives is devoted to ignoring the fact of their inevitable demise, which is never more obvious than it is now, with all the life-affirming consumerisming going on. It makes him smile. It makes him think. And who knows; perhaps Choas, in its infinite unpredictability, has something in store for him that he does not expect.

He sighs again, as the first few fluffy flakes of snow float gently down to the street below. There is a murmer in the moving crowd. They think its magic, in some way. The timing is impecable. So many are entrenched in this idea of holiday that now, on the Eve of celibration, it would seem almost vulgar for the skies to remain clear. Perhaps that is why it is snowing - because the masses expect it so fervently. So much to learn, he thinks again, but now wether it is his own long lifetime he's referring to, not even Pip knows.

He settles on the ledge of the roof, peaceably regarding the hazy Big Ben in the distance as it lets out peel after booming peel of bell-song.

The snow is getting thicker. Pip watches the street-scene below; the smartly dressed shoppers are in a positive frenzy, and old and young men alike hold out their hands to their ladies, inviting them to dance in the snow. At first he is content to watch, but soon his vantage becomes uncomfortable - always looking at, never being with. He feels a slight swell of jealousy as a few children begin a half-hearted snowball fight around the legs of their frazzled mother. Their laughter is infectious. But it will never be something he shares, save that he steals in peeps and glances.

For one of the few times in his long history, Pip feels alone. He sits atop the building for hours, watching the night thicken and the crowd thin, until the only inhabitants of the city scene are the denizens of the alleys, coming out to feed off the dropped dreams of those well-to-do, who are now no doubt snug in their beds, visions of love circling their collective subconciousness.

He should move on, he knew. Go somewhere warm, maybe, Jamaica, perhaps, where he had met a good humoured and enterally stoned rasta, who thought of Pip as 'That strange little monkey-cat," and never hesitated to offer him tea. Pip didn't know wether or not the rasta believed what he saw, or Pip's hesitant confessions about his true nature, but his courtesy was genuine, if sometimes fraught with incredulity.

Yes, Pip thinks, standing. His tail swishes decisively. A warm room shared with a friend. That is exactly the thing to chase away this cold. Even just the thought of it buoys his spirits some, and he feels he can hold off leaving a little longer.

The rooftops sparkle white. It is a whole different city up here, and at this moment, it belongs to anyone willing to claim it. Pip runs gamely on all fours and jumps to the nearest roof, then, spinning gleefully in a spray of snow makes a run for the edge of the roof. His muscles tense almost painfully, and he leeps over the gap of the street and lands surely on the building opposite, rolling and laughing, his knit cap now powdered white in patches.

So much... he thinks again, marvelling at his sudden swing in mood.

He frollicks on the roof tops, leaving the downtown without noticing, and stops only when a backyard garden of particular beauty catches his eye. He quickly scales down the building to regard the fountain, which is frozen in mid stream, ice frosting the stone fish faces in beards and brows of frosty white. He sits a while and thinks of pleasant things.

Then, suddenly, something inside tells him danger is approaching. He crouches and looks around wildly - the windows of the house are all dark, and the hedged yard offers no view of the surrounding properties.

He could take to the roof again, but no; any sudden movement might give away his position. He whispers "Dim," and stays still as stone, waiting for this danger to manifest.

Fireball had heard somthing at the edge of his hearing and then saw something out of the corner of his eye. Fireball knew that there was always things going about their business beyond human preceptions, in fact he had meet some of them. But this was something new to him entirely. He opened the door of the residience that he was lodging in for the duartion of the holiday season. The sound had come from the snow covered garden. Fireball looked around there was nothing there.

But as the young man turned around there was a sound again. Instantly Fireball turned around and grabbed at what looked like thin air. But he realised their was something in his grasp. The more he looked the more he could percieve of what he had in his hand. It is as a veil dissolves the more concentration he exterts on that empty space.

Finally a little creature that reminded him strangely of a cat, yet at the same time a monkey aswell.
"Hello," Fireball says putting the strange creature down, "What manner of being are you?"
Fireball looked at the creature with intrest as he waited for a reply. None was forth coming. Instead this little creature that Fireball did not know what to call bounded over the hedge.

The young man decided to go after it. Calling his apoligies to Mrs Hodges the land lady of this house, the noise and sight had interrupt the delicious afternoon tea she had laid out, he himself leapt over the hedge. He began to chase after the being. The samll creature effortlessly went from one snow covered garden to the next.

Eventually Fireball stopped running. He had lost his concentration and had lost sight of the mysterious being. As Fireball was about to head back to his lodgings their was that faint movement in the middle of his eye again.

He shoot off a small flame from his finger. It hit a nearby tree and caused the creature to fall of the branch it hit. Fireball realizes that this was a mistake for he can clearly see the creature is angry now.

ooc: Cool. And fantastic, by the way.

ic: Pip lay panting in the snow, stunned for only a moment before fury filled his chest.
You, he thought. You creep into my evening and steal away my peace... you grab me roughly and peer at me curiously... I am alien to you; you are not alien to me...

He felt his righteousness rising, a phoenix long fallen crying out from the ashes of his resolve. Let their be blood, then - he was not unfamiliar with it. Beneath his soft skin lay a heart made by the hands of Chaos; and, by God, did it thunder now.

"Boy," called Pip, relishing in the growl her heard in his own voice.

The gaping lad snapped to at once, hisbthrill-of-the-chase dropping from his limbs and turning his green eyes sharp, focused. Pip realized that he was just a boy, really, and for a brief moment he felt reluctant to persue this any further.

Then the boy smiled. It was slanted, a little ********-sure, and was exactly the last thing Pip wanted to see. The boy's eyes travelled up to the smoking jagged nub jutting lamely out of the tree, then down to the twisted branch beneath Pip. Though he couldn't be sure, Pip thought he saw a flicker of guilt pass over the boy's face like a wave on a beach, and recede just as quickly.

Snow was starting the fall again. Bright points of white burning the black of the sky. Pip regarded the house they had stopped beside.

He raised his voice so the boy could hear; he said Sleep.

There was no visible change in situation, save the boy's look of comprehension.

Pip leapt up the side of the tree, scaling around the smoldering stub with ease, and perched on a higher branch. The posture of the lad tightened - he was ready, for sure, and Pip was determined to make it memorable. This Choas is long unstirred.

He pointed to the neighbouring house. And the next. Each time he gestured, and a said, Sleep. They heard a glass shatter, but that was all.

Then he turned he glowing gold eyes to the boy. The more he focused, the brighter they became; the stronger his magic manifested in those secret, special reserves. He hadn't used any in a while. He felt a delicious sense of surpluss.

Speaking loudly and forcefully, he said Chill.

First it began in the fingers and toes, which you curl in your boots but cannot feel. The it runs up your limbs, a white charriot that burns, first, before leaving a deadened, painful cold in its wake. You feel it moving surely towards your heart. Your breath comes out in billowing clouds, doubled from before. The sight of the falling snow provides an ironic distraction, for though it twirls and spirals down merrily, its cousin in your veins has quickened the pace, and in moment you know you might be dead...

It burnt at first, Fireball did not mind has he had the power over flame and heat. Then he could feel his insides becoming as cold as the snow beneath his feat and as numb as the ground beneath that. His breath that was fogging the air before was now invisible and soon small snow flakes were forming on his tongue instead of falling upon it and melting. Fireball concentrated. If you could see his pupil you could see a tiny flickering, a flame with in. The ice on Fireball's tongue melted and the chill within him ceased.

Fireball wanted to understand this being and why it had such power. But the battle had begun and it would have to wait until later. Fireball saw that the creature was weak physically but agile and powers that went far beyond the physical reaches of this world. Fireball, who has a flare for style when using his gift, pointed his fingers like guns.

He fired flames off them like they were six-shooters. The strange being dodged them with amazing acrobatic skill. The little creature flipped and whirled just in front of the house's back wall. Fireball left a trail of burn marks as he tried to keep up.

Fireball final managed to land a hit when he fired a shot with his left hand and the creature dodged it, but had fired a shot from the right to where the creature had moved. This stunned it for a moment. Fireball moved his hand up to his face and blew out the flame that was dancing on his index finger, like a cowboy blows the smoke from his gun barrel.

But the being had escaped up by climbing up the drain pipe. Fireball really should stop joking around so much. He followed the strange creature by ingniting the soles of his feat with his flame. The affect was like a a rocket rising slowly at those few seconds just after ignition.

After he had touched down on the roof he realised that the strange creature was using what ever it is it uses to go unnoticed. He would have to concentrate again for that sound at the edge of hearing or that shadow at the edge of sight.

In his Dim state, Pip seethed. He had gamely hopped the boy's cockiness was masking something weak. The boy had a breathless look to him - his hair mussed and tousled by the wind, kissed by snowflakes, his daring eyes which were now becoming sharp again, focussing, searching. Pip would no longer hesitate. He stood on his hind legs, directly in front of the boy, and when he flashed into view the boy looked shocked, and took a step back. Pip grinned a sinister grin.

"Steady," he whispered through clenched teeth, "this is far from over."

And Pip sprang.

He felt the claws rise through his fingers like sprouts from the spring ground - so natural, so real. But he pulled back his swipe at once, and landed on the boy's chest without drawing blood. His able hands wrapped around the boy's neck and he flipped himself, too quick to see, until he crouched on the boy's shoulders with his nose pressed to the lad's ear.

"Bang-bang, silly rabbit."

Then he vanished.

The boy turned once, twice - fast, Pip thought admirably.

Not fast enough.

Pip took the boy's confusion to his advantage. He circled his legs swiftly, and though the boy saw the telltale sprays of snow and sudden prints on the ground, his grabbing hand always came up empty. Pip took a few swipes, feeling a glorious rush in the boy's confusion, and when the boy let out a roar of frustration, his eyes burned bright.

Pip stopped and took to the air. Floating is easy, when you were born before gravity. He levitated to be just out of snatching reach facing the boy. The dim dripped away from his smile alone, and he registered the boy's heated regard with some sense of satisfaction.

"Good," said Pip. "You're beginning to take this seriously."

In the air, a row of teeth curved in a smile hung suspended seemingly by nothing. The youth regarded them with suspicion. He raised his hands just as the teeth parted and a thick red tongue pushed out - from the dark inside the mouth came a spray of smoke, and the boy began to cough. The tongue withdrew and the hanging grin laughed.

Your eyes loose a little focus, and you shake your head to clear them. The shaking makes it worse, a brings a bright bloom of pain to your temples. You see flashes of pink light streak across your eyeballs, and the scene before you changes; the snow becomes cotton candy, the falling flakes butterflies. As you reach out to touch one, unbelieving, it graces your hand with the slightest tear, and disappears. The grin that hung before you is gone - there, sitting in the air with his long arms and short legs crossed, a somber expression on his strange face, is Pip.

"I will not kill you," he says, and in this vision you feel his voice inside your head. His lips do not move. "But that's all I promise. I do not abide arrogance."

And he reached a slap across the lad's incredulous face.

Fireball reached out and grabbed the strange creature before it moved again. He held his cheek with one hand, that slap had stun, while he held the strange creature by the scruff of the neck with the other.

He through the monkey and cat like being to the ground. It hist the ground with a cruch of snow and the illusion of cotton candy disappeared and reality faded back in. Then fireball held out his palm in the direction of the of the creature. A ball of flame began to form on the open palm.

As the being got up rather groggily Fireball released the ball of flame. The blast left a three metre wide crater in the snow and sent the being flying. With a thud its short flight ended at the back fence of this snow covered garden. Fireball moved over to the strange being.

He held out his hand fingures out streched. A string of fire came from each one and swirled around the small creature. Eventually the formed a cage made of fire. When the creature tried to move he burnt himself on on of the flickering bars of flame.

"If you tell me who you are," said Fireball, "What you are and what your business here is I shall make this cage disappear."
Fireball waited for a nod of understanding but none were forth coming, so he continued. "I shall also share with you some of Mrs Hodges' delightful cream buns before you are on your way." A remark of Mrs Hodges' about only being skin and bones seemed relvant when you saw this creature. Fireball waited a few more minutes then said, "However if you have your own means of getting out I invite you to use it, then do as you will."

Pip considered. It had been a while since he'd been invited to a sit down cream bun.

He wrapped his hands around the bars of the cage. It was not the first time he had been trapped.

His hands gripped the bars of flame; he felt his skin blister and the thin fur on the back of his hands curl and crisp. The blisters boiled, popped, and Pip began to grin.

You see the bar begin to dim around his hands. The dimness spreads, eating away the yellow flame and leaving dark, hard brown curls in its wake. Soon the burning cage is solid, smokeless.

Not the first and not the last.

"Fine," said Pip, breaking away bits of the cage, thoughtfully sucking on a rod as if it were a piece of taffy, and he sauntered forward to stand once again before the boy. The youth seemed disturbed to hear him speak, but a smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth. Pip flicked his tail irritably.

The snow had softened, and the large flakes pinwheeled down to the ground below.

Pip lay his tail on the ground. He leaned back on his hands, and raised his feet and crossed his legs in the air. Then, with the caramelized flame wedged in the corner of his mouth like a cigar, he first brought up one arm, then the other, and soon sat supported by his tail alone.

"I am..." he began, and stopped. He could feel the drousing minds all around them, some sleeping fitfully, others warm and snug. The woman who had dropped the glass was bleeding from a shard wedged into her palm, and dreamt of loud, bright things speeding passed her in the dark. Pip felt a swell of pity, and then flash of shame - there was no Purpose here. Order had cast her eyes away in shame.

He shook his head. "I am late," he said, looking into the lad's piercing green eyes. He tossed the bit of candied cage to the side. "Tell Mrs. Hodges I enjoy her garden. I came here in a fit of melancholy. I leave knowing company is not what I seek."

Pip brought up his tail, curled it comfortably under his short legs.

"Call it a draw, will you?" asked Pip, widening his grin so his sinister teeth flashed their points.

The boy hesitated, that smirk stretching further.

Pip held up his hand, and the tip of his tail flicked moodily. "Call it a draw, or I'll call it a victory."

Though still smiling, the boy pressed his lips together in a churlish pucker. No necessarily conceding but... considering.

Pip supposed it would have to do. He dropped his hand and nodded, once before fading from sight. His grin hung for a moment and said, "But who knows? Maybe I'll take you up on the pastery sometime." The grin faded, and the youth was left alone.

You look around suspiciously. There is a smell in the air; odd for the season and almost spiteful to the snow - rain. The haze of rain over hot pavement. You feel it warm your fingers some, and for a moment your breath comes out clear. The fog soon passes, and the cold comes back in.

As you step to the edge of the roof, you see something out of the corner of your eye, and your hands are moving before you can think. They drop down just as quickly, as you see one snowflake part from the flock and come fluttering towards you, white wings twinkling, and it rests on the tip of your nose before vanishing, its lonely tear the only proof it ever was.

~Fin~

ooc: Uh, I feel we came to a logical conclusion. Besides, my character's sorta a monk - Fireball is too likeable . This is my first real fight, so I hope its cool I kept it short.

OOC: Well played sir. I rather enjoyed our writing. Also one of the best characters I have ever had the pleasure of fighting against. I do not mind the shortness at all.

You too . And I likewise enjoyed it - I felt like we were at once composing a story and playing chess.

After a few more battles, I'm sure Pip might find himself at the Hodges' again... I wonder if Fireball summers there...?

Perhaps he does for a time. Maybe one day pip shall visit fireball's homeland of Australia.