The Solution

First topic message reminder :



The air felt still in the quiet room; it gave off an eerie vibe. The silence, the calm, the open space.... it was all such a big contrast to what'd just happened. That coupled with anticipation was almost enough to unnerve the psychotic, fractured mind of the glaceon in the room.... Almost. If it were Sova, it would have most certainly made him feel uneasy at the very least, but as stated earlier, the mind of the glaceon was fractured. There were two pieces, and the one currently in control was not going to be so easily intimidated by a mere room.

S.S. began to grin in anticipation nearing the center of the room. He could hardly restrain himself from carelessly dumping the contents of his bag to get at the music box and wind it up. Instead, he decided to lay down in the center of the room as he waited for the rest of his group to catch up. Maybe they needed a break.... but did he really care? He stuck his injured paw into his bag.... then paused for a moment. He didn't know quite how bad the little paw injury was since he'd been suppressing his pain reflex. He didn't know if he was making it worse, and he didn't know if it could take the stress of his constant romping around.

Of course, the pain was still there. He'd just been.... ignoring it. Suppressing it. He decided to really feel it for a moment, just to check, and.... well, it hurt. However, it mostly felt sore, not like it was about to break. Now the rest of his body was a different story! His entire body stung from some of the hits he and his weaker half - mostly said weaker half - had sustained. He felt a bit tired still despite having allowed himself to relax too, but that part wasn't news. He wasn't in the greatest shape in the world, but there it wasn't too severe as far as he could tell. Most of the injuries were minor, they just.... added up. The only major ones were the paw and a cut under his right eye that he could feel stinging despite it having been a while ago. This settled it; Sova had just passed out from exhaustion coupled with shock due to pain. Or.... well, was it really passing out?

Either way, all that mattered was that his body was still capable of fighting for him, which it was. He wasn't in perfect condition by any means, but after a short rest, he'd be capable of fighting just as well as usual. Although he still didn't know for sure whether any more fighting would be done or not. He very much wanted to find out, though, which led his thoughts back to the music box. His paw was already in the bag, so.... he just.... went right on ahead and pulled the box out. He stared down at the box, temptation to wind it up rising, but he resisted. Just a few more minutes and he'd be able to sate his desire.

It interested him so much, in fact, that he no longer cared about tormenting Jak.

(So, you guys wanna have a timeskip for a silent, awkward break, then wind the box up? Or just a few posts of chitchat? I'm hoping I'm not the only one who doesn't fancy spending a whole lot of time on this. Could just have this be a short, 4 post thread.)

The game was over.  Oh well, the dragon had put up a good fight, and it'd been entertaining.  Perhaps it was even entertaining enough for him to agree with Sova on this one living....  He hoped to keep such an entertaining companion around for as long as possible.  But for now, it was time to end the fight.  S.S. held his breath in his lungs, his body-temperature dropping and the area around him beginning to freeze now that there was no force of heat to conflict with him.  He waited until Jak fired the attack before counter-attacking, and he put all his energy into this one.

S.S. was no longer testing the waters.  He was through playing games and throwing himself into harm's way to see if this fight was worth fighting.  Besides.... he needed to end it now, as the annoying bird was becoming more and more of a problem.  He recognized the move Varda was using, and he knew it would bring difficulties to his Double Team.  He wasn't entirely sure whether it would simply eat the afterimages or strip him of the speed altogether, but either way, he wasn't interested in waiting for it to happen.

The Dragon Rage came at him, and he let loose his breath with all the force he could muster.  It cut right through the opposing attack, spreading it out as if it were nothing. The attack continued on toward the dragon, but he didn't stop there; he just kept blowing. He kept on blowing as hard as he could, and he intended to do so until he was completely out of breath. He was eager to see Mr. Peace Bird try to stop this!

The breath was soon upon the dragon, and there wasn't time to react. The fire type cut off its attack and closed its wings around itself as the frost bitten air struck it. Ice began to form across the front of its body, with its wings taking the brunt of the attack.  The glaceon began walking forward as he continued to blow, continually getting closer to the dragon so that there would be less time for the frost to dissipate and it would hit harder.  When his breath finally ran out, he stopped for only a moment, forcing breath into his lungs painfully quickly before blowing out another round of the freezing mist.

He had absolutely no intention of stopping.  Not until Jak was laid out on the ground, crippled from the freezing cold.  Even if he passed out from lack of oxygen in the process, he intended see this through until he end, until he could say for certain that he was the victor!  He'd said he wouldn't kill anyone, but nearly killing was something completely different!  Besides, who'd ever said he needed to stay true to his own word!?  His thoughts raced and his state became increasingly manic; he felt so very excited.  His eyes widened and his pupils began to shrink.

What little reason he had was being pushed out of the way by the bloodlust that normally drove him.

Varda continued to fly and spread the icy mist everywhere with every flap of his wings, circling around the fighting Pokémon. He didn't know if it would help, but he sure hoped it did! It was pretty much the only thing he could think of, something to even out the odds! At the very least, the air was now looking a bit thicker, and the slowly falling icy particles twinkled gently on their way down. Perhaps, in another scenario, one might have even been able to enjoy the show.

But the air also grew colder. While the Altaria was slightly worried that it might have been his doing, he was pretty sure that it had never happened in the past, at least! It didn't make things cold! Just in case, Varda topped generating more haze, but it took a while for it to get down to the ground, so he figured it would be enough for a while. Glancing down, it became obvious why everything was getting so cold.

The Glaceon was at it again! Using his icy breath, he was seemingly trying to freeze everything! Despite Jak being a Pokémon with fire, even he was starting to freeze over! That was no good. Varda didn't deal with the ice all that well, so if he got caught by that… It would be really bad! Somehow, he had to stop it. He had no idea how, but… The Altaria drew in a deep breath anyway and forced his feathers to fluff up and protect him.

Then, he circled closer to the Glaceon and folded his wings so he could just swoop down and! And, well. He didn't want to attack. Jak had been doing a lot of attacking, and nothing had snapped Sova back! That couldn't be it. That was why he spread his wings so his landing could be softer, but he didn't land on the floor, no. Instead, he landed on the icy fox and wrapped his wings around the Pokémon's neck as tightly as he could, so he wouldn't fall off, but not tight enough so he would accidentally strangle the Glaceon!

"Snap out of it, Sova!" The bird chirped as he tried to pull the Glaceon's head away from Jak, so the frosty breath wouldn't hit him!

Jak continued to hold his position as the ice type continued to approach him with more force. As the fox came closer, the stronger the icy breath became. At the current rate the battle was going, he was going be a dragon Popsicle!

The dragon quickly realized that if he didn’t do something, he was going to be encased in ice! Quickly, Jak began to shoot embers out into his wings to help keep them heated. The ice still sticking to the outside due to the constant attack the ice type kept up.

Jak was too focused on keeping himself from freezing to death to hear Varda’s actions in the background. His attempts to keep his wings warmed up seemed to be working as it prevented the spread of the ice from going any further around his body. Eventually he moved his tail closer to himself to retain even more heat, just in case.

In his manic blood-rage, S.S. entirely failed to notice the bird coming down at him. He was far too focused on the charizard to care right up until he had a big ball of annoying attaching itself to him. Regardless of how strong he was, he simply didn't have a high enough constitution to capably carry an altaria, especially without any warning. He would have pulled himself away, but the bird was gripping pretty tightly to him; an impressive feat with wings. His Frost Breath was halted and he dropped to the ground under the sudden extra weight as the bird shouted at him, calling him Sova once more. He wasn't Sova, and it was really starting to annoy him that he was continuously being thought of as Sova. What did he have to do to prove that he existed too, that it wasn't just Sova!?

"I...." he muttered as he tried to pull away from the bird.
He willingly looked the annoying creature right in the eyes, and he did not have a manic smile like he usually did. His facial expression was serious, and very agitated. His ears lowered as the continuous offense of the two dragons acting like he didn't exist began to get to him. Oddly enough, he cared about something other than violence.... and what better way to get what he wanted than through more violence? "I'm not Sova!" he shouted at the bird before taking in a deep breath, preparing to use Frost Breath once more.

Varda was right in his face, clinging to him for dear life, so he doubted there would be any trouble landing this attack. It was infuriating enough to not be acknowledged as a living being, but the fact that it was so heavily interfering in his fun was just intolerable. He wouldn't kill the bird, just.... maim, to send a message. The message was to shut the Hell up already and just let him have his fun in peace before he decided to see what altaria blood looked like.

Varda landed on the Glaceon, causing the slightly smaller Pokémon to lose his ability to stand up straight! A bird Pokémon wasn't the heaviest kind of a Pokémon in the world, but thanks to his new, much bigger size… Well, the Altaria certainly was heftier than the little cotton ball he had been. At least that had caused the Glaceon to stop attacking Jak, so it was fine! At least he assumed that he hadn't hurt anyone with his landing, but… They didn't really have the time to be checking that!

He didn't let the icy fox go. His wings were wrapped tight, as if holding onto the Pokémon was a matter of life and death – and maybe it was. If the Glaceon rushed off, going as fast as he did… Maybe they couldn't catch him anymore! That would be bad, Sova could get hurt!
"I… I know. That's alright," the bird chirped quietly to the Glaceon who was claiming to be Sova. Of course he wasn't Sova. Sova didn't do things like these. But the thing was, they needed Sova back. Sova wouldn't be fighting like this.

But Varda couldn't really get to say that. The Glaceon drew in a breath, causing the bird to blink and bring his face closer, inserting the tip of his beak into the other Pokémon's mouth. He had been talking of the forbidden technique, but he didn't exactly have lips to pucker up or a nose to rub against someone, so he did the best he could!

As the icy wind stopped, Jak spewed out flames towards the ground to engulf himself in the warmth. Just when the ice melted enough, he bent his limbs and had it shatter it a million pieces. However, by the time that happened, he saw the bird hanging onto the fox tightly.

Hearing the fox protest, stating it wasn’t Sova. The second he saw the ice type begin inhaling, he prepared to jump in to stop whatever it was planning but was caught completely off guard at what happened next.

The bird had just gone in for what it looked like to him… a kiss??? He was completely shocked, causing him to stare in shock.

S.S. drew in his breath, planning to let the attack loose so fast that the bird wouldn't be able to avoid it and Jak wouldn't be able to stop him.  However, Varda didn't exactly try to avoid it.  Instead, the bird immediately moved his head forward, sticking his beak in the fox's mouth.  The glaceon hesitated for only a moment before recoiling, pulling his head away and coughing out his freezing breath in unfocused puffs all over the place.  It would still burn, but it hadn't been properly executed and thus most of the burning mist wasn't be condensed at the bird.

"Wha-" he began, but he simply couldn't find the words to describe the shock and frustration he felt at this.
He was very upset, but not in a way that made him want to hurt anything.  This.... whatever this was.... had completely killed his mood and made it utterly unappealing to continue fighting.  His bloodlust had simply vanished, replaced with confusion and frustration.
"Get off," he ordered, though he wasn't giving the annoyance a choice.
A harsh, freezing wind suddenly whipped up to blow the altaria off of him, and there was no mercy spared in it.  However, the temperature of it was noticeably higher than his previous attacks, due to exhaustion and overuse of the move.

"I'm done.  You killed my mood, congratu-f*cking-lations," he stated bitterly.
It was clear that he wasn't happy about this situation and he wasn't making any effort to hide it.  If the two did anything even remotely provocative, there was a significant possibility that the whole "no killing" deal would be voided, but for now, he didn't even want to continue the fight.  He was very upset, but violence was his idea of fun, and this was no longer fun.  He didn't fight out of anger unless someone reeeeeeally upset him.

Varda's beak was now inside the Glaceon's mouth. He wasn't entirely sure what he was supposed to do now, but this was probably enough… Right? There indeed was a reaction of some sort as the icy fox pulled his head back, small puffs of powdery ice and snow escaping the Pokémon's mouth as he coughed. It certainly wasn't an attack, but the air was cold enough that it caused the feathers on the Altaria's face to start freezing and turning white, covered in frost.

But he didn't want to accidentally strangle his friend now that he had caused him to cough, so the bird allowed his wings to loosen their grip slightly – which apparently was just enough for the faster gale of freezing wind to grab onto his wings and whisk him backwards, getting a surprised whoa chirped out of the Pokémon's beak. Varda managed to land somehow, looking quite surprised that he had managed to stay on his feet himself as well!

Yet… The Glaceon was angry. Angry, but not attacking. He had stopped it all. Even though the Altaria didn't like making someone angry… Right now his eyes lit up and sparkled.
"It… It worked? It worked!" Varda chirped, to no one in particular. Perhaps he was just talking out loud to himself. But he was so happy! The forbidden technique really, really worked!
"Um," the bird's initial excitement seemed to die down a bit as he turned to look at the Glaceon, concern in his eyes,
"Do you think… You could let Sova back now? We should really get back home and tell everyone what happened…"

S.S. glared and growled as the bird spoke. Leaving sounded pretty good right about now, but he wasn't exactly in direct control of that, especially after he'd suppressed Sova already. Given the choice, he'd have already been gone by this point, but he didn't have such a luxury. His eyes narrowed as he took in a deep breath in an attempt to calm himself. He didn't want to kill the fluffy bird.... Okay, he did want to, and that was the problem. Varda was just so insufferably.... Varda-y. There was no other way to describe it.

"You think I WANT to stick around and deal with you!? If you think anyone would willingly put up with you for this long, you're more of an idiot than I thought," he started up verbally berating the bird, icy haze escaping his mouth in the process.
His lungs were still at a very low, sub-freezing temperature. He took a step toward the fluffy ball of idiocy before continuing: "You're lucky you're even alive, so don't push it!! You did nothing but take all the fun out of this, and if you keep it up, I'll take all the life out of your body! So please, keep acting like some mentally handicapped little pidgy who thinks he's invincible, and WE'LL SEE HOW THOSE VOCAL CORDS YOU LOVE SO MUCH LOOK OUTSIDE OF YOUR BODY!!"

He was very upset, to say the least. He felt that every word out of the arrogant altaria's mouth just disrespected him in all the wrong ways. He'd willingly chosen to stop, and his thanks was having to listen to this bird brag about being the one to do it? Varda had ignored his existence, ruined his fight, and insulted his conscience.... No-one without Sova's blessing would be permitted to live at this point.

(Koozie3000 wanted skipped. Sorry I didn't get to it sooner; I was busy practicing being a potato.)

Varda titled his head, looking as oblivious as ever. Okay, he knew that he had messed up considering that he was being yelled at… So that made him look a bit concerned. Maybe… The Glaceon didn't like the kiss after all. Well, it wasn't like he wanted to do the kiss either, but they kind of had to! It had worked, after all, so it was worth it! But his friend was now annoyed. Was it… Maybe the Glaceon's first kiss?! That wouldn't be good if he took it! Then again, it was the Altaria's first kiss too, but he didn't really mind all that much when it went to a good cause.

He didn't know what this vocal cords thingy was, so the bird didn't look all that intimidated. Instead, he just tilted his head to the other side and frowned.
"Oh… I'm sorry," Varda cooed, indeed looking like he had done the worst possible thing in the world and now feeling the weight of the guilt on his shoulders. He wasn't entirely sure what the issue was, but that didn't matter. The Glaceon was angry at him. Was Sova angry too?

"We just… Don't really have the time for this and, um, really should be going back home now. Maybe you can continue a bit later," he continued to chirp, his gaze falling down to stare at his toes. He couldn't even really feel his toes. It was awfully cold…



((I'll put you in the oven.))

Jak remained where he was as the bird seemed to handle the whole issue rather well. Despite how S.S was reacting to the whole thing, at least the ice type stopped. It was one less thing he had to deal with now.

As the ice type began to get a bit violent with its response. It was blatantly obvious it didn’t like the bird’s request, nor did it like being with the group. Jak didn’t like where this was going at this point, planning to jump into the conversation and make Varda hush.

When the bird repeated that they should be heading home. Jak started to walk over towards the bird. “Varda… I don’t think it is smart to continue.” Jak stated calmly to the bird. The blood that was on his chest was still there, but starting to dry up. It didn’t seem like he was bleeding any longer, and his fire seemed a bit lighter on the end of his tail, each movement causing it to flare up slightly. It was clear the fire type was starting to get tired… although it wasn’t apparent in any other way than his tail flame at the moment.

Jak turned towards S.S after speaking to the bird. He watched the ice for a moment before beginning to speak once more. “You make an excellent hunter…” Jak said in a calm tone, only to pause before adding one last thing. “S.S.”

Jak glanced around the room to see the damage that they had potentially caused, only to sigh lightly from the sight. “You have me beat…” the fire type admitted. He really didn’t want to say it, but he felt that it might possibly help the situation.

....The bird was supposed to beg, not apologize.  S.S. growled in response to the continued oblivious behavior; this just wasn't good enough to make up for the previous offenses.  It was a start, but he still kind of wanted to break Varda's wings.  His breathing was heavy and he had a furious glare, neither of which were common for him.  This whole "unbridled rage" thing was more for Sova, while S.S. was supposed to be the "happy" one.  Sure, maybe his happiness was conditional to the presence of blood, but at least he wasn't normally like this.  It felt bad, and it didn't help please him....  All he lived for was to be pleased, to be.... sated.... and this wasn't really doing it.

Then the more fun dragon intervened, shutting the bird up.... hopefully.  If Varda kept talking, well, there was only so much he could take.  While he was highly aggressive, he was also far more tolerant than Sova.  However, that didn't mean his patience was limitless.  He was actually glad that Jak had stepped in, but not just that; Jak was.... complimenting him?  The dragon didn't seem afraid, so it didn't appear to be out of fear.  Why was he receiving praise?  He tilted his head, the glare fading and being replaced with a confused look.  It was almost sane, almost.... welcoming to look at compared to how he normally was.  Well, compared to how he always was.  He just didn't understand why someone would ever compliment him.

"I....  I'm done fighting, so you can stop trying to get me to spare you...." he muttered, looking away toward the ground.
For a moment, there was true surprise present in his tone.  Honestly, he just wanted the compliments to be self-centered in nature.  He didn't know how to handle something like a genuine compliment.  He preferred the two just hating him, and if he had to act provocative and egotistical to put everyone back in their rightful places, that was something he could do.  Well, maybe Varda's rightful place was annoyingly loving everyone, but Jak.... Jak was supposed to not like him.  They were supposed to argue, as they had been.  But above all, he didn't need anyone's.... compliments.

(Kinky.)

Varda kept staring at his toes, twiddling them and letting them interlock. He never really got a response to his apologies, so he didn't know if he was forgiven… And that was literally the worst. It made him feel a bit sad, he didn't want anyone to be angry at him… He hadn't really meant it! The bird hadn't tried to insult anyone. He didn't get it, but it still felt bad.

But Jak spoke up. He didn't really comment on whether or not the icy Pokémon had forgiven the Altaria, but, well, there was only one Pokémon who would have known that. Varda blinked and looked up, directing his gaze all the way up to the dragon's face! He certainly had to crane his neck a lot to be able to do that. All of a sudden, Jak had become so big…

"Oh!" The bird suddenly called out, his eyes growing larger as a flash of realization struck him,
"Are you alright, Jak? Are you hurt?" He cooed, tilting his head. All this worrying about Sova, but there were more than just him who was in trouble here!



((No. I'm just hungry. :<))

Jak let out a light smile as the ice type muttered its response. It stated that he was done fighting and he should stop trying to get it to spare him. Although Jak wasn’t entirely sure about what his compliment may have done, but he had a small feeling that he might have the slightest bit more respect from S.S, even if it isn’t much.

As the bird finally realized that Jak was still injured, it quickly inquired whether or not Jak was alright. “I’m fine… Just a flesh wound some would say, hehe...” Jak responded somewhat half-heartedly. It was true that he was alright, but it still had some form of pain that came with the injury. “What about you?” he decided to ask back in response.

The other two were now talking with each other, trying to assure that they were both alright. Well, S.S. already knew neither of them had fatal injuries, considering he'd been the direct cause of said injuries. It'd been his goal not to kill either of them, and he was fairly confident in his ability to do such a thing. Granted, while killing was easy, not killing could be a bit.... harder at times. He decided to just ignore the conversation and let the other two decide on their own whether or not he'd killed them, though. Because he'd clearly caused severe injuries; they were obviously crippled, on the ground, bleeding to death.

Then he realized the seed he'd been holding was no longer in his mouth. Had he swallowed it!? No.... if he had, he'd be invisible. He scanned the area with his eyes and spotted the seed on the ground nearby; he'd dropped it during the fight, having gotten a bit carried away. Well, he hadn't needed to use it anyway, so it was no big deal. He left the other two to retrieve the things he'd dropped, namely the seed and the spike.... and everything else because his bag was currently on the ground. He picked the seed up in his mouth and started off toward his bag.

Sova would probably be upset about the new move, but he didn't really care. Then again, maybe Sova would feel the same way as him about it. But hey, it was his body too! He had the right to change things about himself if he wanted to! It wasn't like Sova ever gave any consideration to what he wanted, so there was absolutely no reason for him to do such a thing.