Shaun and Liz had been spending a disgusting amount of time together, exploring the castle and wandering around Hogsmeade. Today they'd decided it was time to go collect Susan--a Susan who seemed much happier with that Charles bloke around, and who was quite willing to go for a walk in the snow.
What none of them had counted on was a barrage of snowballs. Seemingly out of the blue, one smacked Shaun square in the face, while another exploded when it hit Susan's hair, which coiled angrily and tried to shake the snowflakes out. Her eyes narrowed as she hunted for the source of the thing, while Liz--who was trying not to laugh, and failing utterly--wiped at Shaun's now-frozen face with the end of her scarf.
"Somebody's gonna pay for that," he spluttered, blinking. "Dunno who, but they'll pay."
Jaime had taken cover behind the nearest bench, his back to the three of them as he was focusing on Tomo (and partly on Sparky due to the random snow barrage). He didn't have the fine art of snowball-packing down yet, but the ones he did manage to make that didn't fall apart hit their target every time. Using one's sentient alien biotech to help aim didn't count as cheating when you also used it to ensure there weren't any rocks in the snowballs you threw. So there.
He glanced back at them - and winced as a snowball hit him in the side of the head. "Ack!" Wiping his face, he ducked and ran over to take cover behind a larger statue, closer to where they were standing. "Sorry. She's got a huge stockpile and really bad aim. Usually."
The three of them joined Jaime behind the bench, Shaun still wiping snow from his face, Susan with her hair still coiling like a nest of angry snakes. Liz alone had escaped the barrage unscathed, and she peered over the bench at the girl with the mountain of snowballs at her disposal.
"Good grief, she must have been making those for hours," she said, ducking as a stray round came flying by.
"We need to go over the top," Shaun said, busily packing a massive snowball of his own. "Come on, we can take her."
"Shaun, she's a teenager," Liz said severely--or started to; another stray snowball caught her smack in the face.
Shaun laughed. "You were saying?" he said, as she sat and shook her head, wiping snow out of her ears.
"How do we do this, Jaime?" Susan asked. He clearly knew the girl, even if none of the rest of them did. She hadn't fought in a snowball war she she was very, very little, but the basic principle was the same no matter how old you were.
Knowing Tomo didn't always help; it just meant you knew her idea of strategy was to be completely random. The only reason she was managing to hit anyone was because she wasn't bothering to aim and just throwing wildly
( ... )
Shaun, veteran of the snowball wars that he was, finished helping Liz wipe her face off and immediately began assembling his own small arsenal. To Liz's disgust and Susan's bemusement, he spat on them as he packed them together.
"Freezes 'em," he said, catching Susan's expression. "Makes 'em a little harder."
"...Only you, Shaun," Susan said, shaking her head. She'd always been the little bastard who put rocks in hers--cheating, but at least it didn't involve spit.
Liz ran a hand through her hair, shaking out the last of the snow. "I'm Liz," she said to Jaime. "Pleased to meet you." She ducked as three more snowballs sailed over her head in quick succession. "Do you know that girl?" She nodded at the makeshift snow-fort, wondering why she was even contemplating rushing and tackling a teenager.
Jaime wasn't normally the type to put rocks in snowballs and such - that was Brenda and Paco's domain, and he usually ended up cleaning up in the aftermath. In Tomo's case, though, he could understand making an exception.
"Unfortunately," he sighed. "Tomo's... a special kinda crazy. Like the little sister I never wanted. She also can't hit the broad side of a barn." Hence, the unknown third party behind the snow fort. There was one other person there, but the scarab couldn't get any readings off them.
"COWARDS!" Tomo shouted from the other end of the courtyard. "TREMBLE BEFORE ME - AAH!" She ducked just in time to keep from getting hit in the head again, slipped and fell down.
Jaime smirked, and then paused, cocking his head as if he was listening to something. "Huh. Almost like there's a pattern." He turned back to Shaun and Susan. "If a couple of us circle around and the rest draw her fire, we could get her from behind," he suggested. "Not like it's hard to distract her anyway."
Shaun raised his cricket bat in salute. "I'll draw their fire," he said. He wasn't about to let Liz be a sacrificial goat, and Susan could probably do a lot more damage behind the lines than he could. Besides, he had his cricket bat--theoretically he could whack at least some of the snowballs before they hit him.
"We should load up," Liz added. "Get at least one to use ourselves, just in case." Unfortunately, it was pretty much impossible to carry a lot of snowballs with them, but at least they could get one shot in.
"Would it be terribly wrong to cheat?" Susan wondered aloud. So far as she was concerned, this meant war, and if she had to stop Time to dump snow over someone's head, she'd do it.
Jaime nodded at Liz's suggestion, already attempting to pack another couple of snowballs for the arsenal. He finally managed to get a couple that would stay together.
He looked up at Susan's question and opened his mouth to say, Does that even matter at this point? when the scarab chimed in eagerly. Okay, better phrase his response a bit better so as not to encourage it. "Well, she's not exactly playing fair either," he pointed out. "So if we're just talking a way to even the odds..." Jaime grinned. The odds were not so unbalanced as to require suiting up, but if she was thinking what he thought she was, he wasn't going to argue.
Shaun nodded, his expression deadly serious. "I'm going in," he said, and with that leapt over the bench, cricket bat at the ready.
Liz snorted, shaking her head. That was so very...Shaun, really. "All right, I've got a few of these things...let's do this." She wondered what Susan meant by 'cheating'--was she going to do the whole...Time stopping thing? Liz had heard about that from Shaun, but had never actually seen it herself.
"Indeed," Susan said, and reached out to touch both Jaime and Liz. She couldn't snap her fingers like that, but she didn't really need to; it just sort of...happened. "You know, we really could have just taken Shaun with us," she mused, as Time shuddered to a halt.
"No, let him have his fun." Liz gathered a few more snowballs. "He can pretend he's in 'Platoon'."
Tomo saw Shaun leap over the bench and grinned. Finally! "A CHALLENGER APPEARS!" she yelled, throwing snowballs wildly in his direction. Half a dozen more - these filled with ice chunks - came flying over the barrier as well, probably better aimed than her wild pitches
( ... )
Liz blinked. She'd pictured what it must be like, standing in stopped Time, and while the reality pretty much matched her imagination, it was a lot more...intense. And bizarre. "Me too," she said, looking at Susan. "This is amazing--I really wish I knew how you did it."
"I do, too," Susan admitted, eying Shaun. He really was going to get absolutely hammered by snowballs, once Time started up again. "All right, let's do this."
She led them around the improvised fort, and there found...a teenage girl and a very, very peculiar man. There was a rather impressive pile of snowballs, too, and she looked at Liz and Jaime. "Why don't we get rid of these before we do anything else," she suggested. "That way they can't retaliate."
Jaime followed her around the fort, and seeing Richard, stopped dead. "What the hell?" Of all the possible accomplices, this was... not what he expected.
He recovered enough to put a hand on Susan's shoulder. "I wouldn't touch that guy if I were you," he cautioned. "He might be able to... warp the temporal field?" He shook his head to clear it, not wanting to parse that explanation into plain English. "Whatever. Crazy undead warlock, likes throwing fire, I have no idea what he's doing back here."
Carefully, he stepped around the frozen snowball fiends, giving Richard a wide berth as he started gathering up snowballs. He handed Liz and Susan snowballs as he did so, because there wasn't enough space for all three of them to gather the pile up at once. "Might want to step back a bit before you restart Time, too," he added. In case Richard did try to throw fireballs. Why he was stocking up Tomo's snowball arsenal instead, though, Jaime had no idea.
Susan eyed Richard, appraising. One of her chiefest faults was the inability to fear almost anything, and thus she made no effort to avoid him as she helped them steal snowballs.
Liz, being very human and thus a lot more cautious, did give Richard a wide berth. She had no desire to get crispy-fried, and unlike Susan couldn't stop Time if he tried.
"What can the hospital wing do about burns, here?" she asked Jaime quietly, watching Susan with a faint sense of alarm. She knew the woman well enough by now to know that something like a warlock wasn't going to faze her.
Jaime frowned. Susan could probably take Richard, but Liz was normal, and no-kill spell or not, that didn't mean third-degree burns were out of the picture. "They can do a lot, but..." Well, he didn't have to bring the armor out all the way to manage a shield if he had to. "You might wanna stay behind me. Or focus on Tomo and I'll get his attention." Since Richard had been so interested in trying to push his buttons the last time, that was plausible.
One second Richard was magically flicking ice balls over the barrier at whoever was crazy enough to charge them, and the next there were no ice or snow balls to flick. And then the snowball smacked him in the face.
Coughing and spluttering, he jumped to his feet, surprisingly nimble for an undead guy in the snow. "Who threw that?" he demanded, glaring around him.
As his head swiveled in Liz's direction, another snowball struck him in the side of the head - this time from Jaime. Normally, provoking the undead warlock wasn't Jaime's idea of fun, but he had told Liz he'd get Richard's attention.
What none of them had counted on was a barrage of snowballs. Seemingly out of the blue, one smacked Shaun square in the face, while another exploded when it hit Susan's hair, which coiled angrily and tried to shake the snowflakes out. Her eyes narrowed as she hunted for the source of the thing, while Liz--who was trying not to laugh, and failing utterly--wiped at Shaun's now-frozen face with the end of her scarf.
"Somebody's gonna pay for that," he spluttered, blinking. "Dunno who, but they'll pay."
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He glanced back at them - and winced as a snowball hit him in the side of the head. "Ack!" Wiping his face, he ducked and ran over to take cover behind a larger statue, closer to where they were standing. "Sorry. She's got a huge stockpile and really bad aim. Usually."
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"Good grief, she must have been making those for hours," she said, ducking as a stray round came flying by.
"We need to go over the top," Shaun said, busily packing a massive snowball of his own. "Come on, we can take her."
"Shaun, she's a teenager," Liz said severely--or started to; another stray snowball caught her smack in the face.
Shaun laughed. "You were saying?" he said, as she sat and shook her head, wiping snow out of her ears.
"How do we do this, Jaime?" Susan asked. He clearly knew the girl, even if none of the rest of them did. She hadn't fought in a snowball war she she was very, very little, but the basic principle was the same no matter how old you were.
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"Freezes 'em," he said, catching Susan's expression. "Makes 'em a little harder."
"...Only you, Shaun," Susan said, shaking her head. She'd always been the little bastard who put rocks in hers--cheating, but at least it didn't involve spit.
Liz ran a hand through her hair, shaking out the last of the snow. "I'm Liz," she said to Jaime. "Pleased to meet you." She ducked as three more snowballs sailed over her head in quick succession. "Do you know that girl?" She nodded at the makeshift snow-fort, wondering why she was even contemplating rushing and tackling a teenager.
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"Unfortunately," he sighed. "Tomo's... a special kinda crazy. Like the little sister I never wanted. She also can't hit the broad side of a barn." Hence, the unknown third party behind the snow fort. There was one other person there, but the scarab couldn't get any readings off them.
"COWARDS!" Tomo shouted from the other end of the courtyard. "TREMBLE BEFORE ME - AAH!" She ducked just in time to keep from getting hit in the head again, slipped and fell down.
Jaime smirked, and then paused, cocking his head as if he was listening to something. "Huh. Almost like there's a pattern." He turned back to Shaun and Susan. "If a couple of us circle around and the rest draw her fire, we could get her from behind," he suggested. "Not like it's hard to distract her anyway."
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"We should load up," Liz added. "Get at least one to use ourselves, just in case." Unfortunately, it was pretty much impossible to carry a lot of snowballs with them, but at least they could get one shot in.
"Would it be terribly wrong to cheat?" Susan wondered aloud. So far as she was concerned, this meant war, and if she had to stop Time to dump snow over someone's head, she'd do it.
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Jaime nodded at Liz's suggestion, already attempting to pack another couple of snowballs for the arsenal. He finally managed to get a couple that would stay together.
He looked up at Susan's question and opened his mouth to say, Does that even matter at this point? when the scarab chimed in eagerly. Okay, better phrase his response a bit better so as not to encourage it. "Well, she's not exactly playing fair either," he pointed out. "So if we're just talking a way to even the odds..." Jaime grinned. The odds were not so unbalanced as to require suiting up, but if she was thinking what he thought she was, he wasn't going to argue.
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Liz snorted, shaking her head. That was so very...Shaun, really. "All right, I've got a few of these things...let's do this." She wondered what Susan meant by 'cheating'--was she going to do the whole...Time stopping thing? Liz had heard about that from Shaun, but had never actually seen it herself.
"Indeed," Susan said, and reached out to touch both Jaime and Liz. She couldn't snap her fingers like that, but she didn't really need to; it just sort of...happened. "You know, we really could have just taken Shaun with us," she mused, as Time shuddered to a halt.
"No, let him have his fun." Liz gathered a few more snowballs. "He can pretend he's in 'Platoon'."
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"I do, too," Susan admitted, eying Shaun. He really was going to get absolutely hammered by snowballs, once Time started up again. "All right, let's do this."
She led them around the improvised fort, and there found...a teenage girl and a very, very peculiar man. There was a rather impressive pile of snowballs, too, and she looked at Liz and Jaime. "Why don't we get rid of these before we do anything else," she suggested. "That way they can't retaliate."
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He recovered enough to put a hand on Susan's shoulder. "I wouldn't touch that guy if I were you," he cautioned. "He might be able to... warp the temporal field?" He shook his head to clear it, not wanting to parse that explanation into plain English. "Whatever. Crazy undead warlock, likes throwing fire, I have no idea what he's doing back here."
Carefully, he stepped around the frozen snowball fiends, giving Richard a wide berth as he started gathering up snowballs. He handed Liz and Susan snowballs as he did so, because there wasn't enough space for all three of them to gather the pile up at once. "Might want to step back a bit before you restart Time, too," he added. In case Richard did try to throw fireballs. Why he was stocking up Tomo's snowball arsenal instead, though, Jaime had no idea.
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Liz, being very human and thus a lot more cautious, did give Richard a wide berth. She had no desire to get crispy-fried, and unlike Susan couldn't stop Time if he tried.
"What can the hospital wing do about burns, here?" she asked Jaime quietly, watching Susan with a faint sense of alarm. She knew the woman well enough by now to know that something like a warlock wasn't going to faze her.
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"Oh, I won't," Susan said, with an unpleasantly gleeful smile. She hefted a rather massive snowball in one hand. "All right, three...two...one..."
She snapped her fingers, and Time came rushing back just as she hurled her snowball at the warlock.
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One second Richard was magically flicking ice balls over the barrier at whoever was crazy enough to charge them, and the next there were no ice or snow balls to flick. And then the snowball smacked him in the face.
Coughing and spluttering, he jumped to his feet, surprisingly nimble for an undead guy in the snow. "Who threw that?" he demanded, glaring around him.
As his head swiveled in Liz's direction, another snowball struck him in the side of the head - this time from Jaime. Normally, provoking the undead warlock wasn't Jaime's idea of fun, but he had told Liz he'd get Richard's attention.
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