31_days | [Sept 27] [Original] Not Like That!

Title: Not Like That!
Day/Theme: Sept 27 - "in any case, try many things"
Series: Original
Characters: two original (Memorain/Veedran)
Rating: PG - for language
A/N: Set in a fantasy world that I've spent too long world building and not enough time actually writing. These two characters are of the "Catrek" race (my own furry-like cat race, hybrid-type just cat ears/tails)

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Not Like That!

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Memorain growled, clashing his fangs as he did his best to keep his temper in check. The damnable brat was so set on being annoying. Even after a thousand years, the boy had grown - but only grown into more of an annoyance than his child-like self. To everyone else, the big grin and covered eyes - because the boy was, at least as far as true eyesight was considered, blind - Veedran may have seemed like a happy, innocent teenager. But, like most teenagers, he was anything but innocent.

In so far as Memorain cared.

But he had pulled the boy aside from his questing party, noticing the way the boy was slowly stretching away from his normal attempts at tapping into his magical energies. Things could get dangerous very soon, very fast, unless something was done.

Although he was a great Catrek mage, once feared now forgotten, Memorain had always been wary at the idea of teaching the bouncy youngster. Veedran may have been Catrek, but his true form, his true potential, that mystery that he would never reveal...the power lying within the brat was so far beyond what Memorain could ever hope to tap into. So alike, and yet so different, too.

But now the world was in terrible chaos. The once ever-present, forgotten Barrier was now gone. The Northern Armies of Vokuusa were rampaging. The Southern Armies of the Industrialized Humans were controlling. Both working together to net the world in a complex whirl of slavery and taint.

Only those few left of the ancient world knew such things had not always been, knew that Avairean's world was meant to be more than this. Memorain was one of the few who had been there at the beginning. For his part, Veedran had as well, if only as a mere child. There were others, too, such as the immortal dragonoid Veedran had decided to befriend. And there may have been more.

But for now, the world depended on the blind brat of a mystery boy. So, Memorain snapped his jaws, tapped his fangs, and prayed that this child born of chaos would at least learn some form of order before the end of the world forced him out of his comfortable typical teenager view.

I've tried so many times to get this boy to understand his importance...

"So, Memmy, when does the training begin?"

Clenching his hands, wishing for his staff, Memorain cleared his mind and faced the boy with a thin aura of patience. "We have to figure out which element you are most attuned to."

"Fire."

With a blink, Memorain stared back at the boy, who was now putting his hands behind his head and leaning back in a pose of boredom. "What?"

Veedran laughed. "I already know that much. Fire has always been the easiest for me to control. Back in the castle, you know, way back when, I used to copy your movements and call words in secret."

"But...the earthquake..." Memorain stuttered, caught off guard, recalling a time when a cataclysmic earthquake shook the entire world, toppling a temple as far as the Elven Isles.

Veedran. "Sure, I was always good at making earth react. But the one I had most control over has been fire."

With a sigh, Memorain felt his tail twitch behind him. Damnable brat... "I hate fire," he murmured.

Veedran laughed. "Aw, Memmy, but isn't lightning a part of fire...?"

"No, not at all." He corrected, feeling his ears twitch at the very thought. "It couples with it. It isn't part of it."

"But, isn't that the same thing?"

Groaning, because he absolutely despised teaching, Memorain responded. "No, it's not. I'm proficient in Earth and in Lightning, but not in Fire or Metal."

"Metal?"

Twitch. "Yes. The ability is there, but there are very few - if any - cases of a Catrek actually bending Metal or calling Metal into existence. But the ability is there, I assure you."

Veedran looked up to the sky. Well, he supposed the boy wasn't really looking because the brat couldn't exactly see. He saw a different way. A matter of sensing the elements. A trick, Memorain had told him once, that Catrek learned over the years - a lie, because no mortal being could sense such things as life. Not even a mortal who had cheated death and lived over seven thousand years.

"I still say my element is fire."

"Prove it." The words were out before he could hold them back.

One would think that after seven thousand years of living, he would have learned to better hold his tongue. At one point, he definitely would have held back. But after so long of living with Veedran, he was easily pulled back to his younger days with the brat - back to the days when he had lost his temper and melted the boys eyes out of anger.

In answer, Veedran called on the element of fire and was soon covered in his element of choice. Memorain stared at the flaming Catrek teenager, feeling his mouth gape open, feeling his ears and tail flop, feeling his eyes just...stare. He had never before seen an elemental user able to surround themselves in fire. Earth, yes, he had seen earth. But FIRE?

"Falik," he cursed, as the fire raged to the sky and left the boy in a beam, shooting into the clouds.

Veedran was grinning like a fool. Memorain was still staring, blinking his eyes, as he came to the realization that the boy may not be able to be trained by one such as he after all. Only a god could...

And their Dradian friend was the one to break them both back into the world. "You idiot! Now everyone and their father knows where we are!"