neutral_omens | (no subject)

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(no subject)

Date: December 20, 1999
Setting: The grounds
Status: Public
Summary: War starts a snowball fight.

There’s all sorts of speculation on why wars break out, and though not many say it, most of it is due to boredom.

War had been bored. She had been bored in 1812 and re-fought on the sea a conflict that had already been settled on land. She had been bored in 1914, and had succeeded in getting millions of men to sit in miles and miles of pestilential ditches and shoot at each other for no good reason. There was nothing like a good bloody battle for light entertainment.

And she was bored now, and had had no way of relieving the ennui of the tentative, resentful peace in the Manor. An all-out skirmish would not be permitted, at least here, so War had designed the next best thing to ease the passage of a tedious day.

She was propped up on the edge of a tightly-packed fort on an incline on the lawn. She smiled a smile almost as cold and biting as the air around her, and her breath rose in thin tendrils of steam as she packed snow into a hard icy ball. She examined it, tossing it to herself a few times: it was heavy, sculpted into almost a perfect sphere, and about as aerodynamic as snow could be. Her smile sharpened. This baby was going to sting.

War wrapped her mink-trimmed coat tighter around her, kneeled to peek over the top of the snow-fort’s walls, and lay in wait for prey.

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Famine exited Tadfield Manor, not noticing the snow fort on the lawn due to the blinding expanse of white in front of him, and not expecting anything unusual. After all, what could happen in Tadfield.

War raised one eyebrow and smirked. Famine. Of course. Anytime war and snow were mixed, he was sure to follow. And old companionship, she reasoned as she kissed the snowball and let loose, aiming, for Famine's cheek, would never stop her from having a bit of fun.

The last thing Famine had expected was a snowball - a very hard snowball, no less, almost an ice ball - to strike him in the face the moment he was outside. In hindsight it really shouldn't have been so surprising, what with the heavy snowfall and War being in the immediate vicinity. He looked in the direction the snowball had come from and was surprised when he didn't immediately see her. Of course, after a moment he noticed the fort and grinned.

War stood and leaned over the wall, grinning something ranging on good-naturedly. "Going to beg for mercy, Famine? Won't make me stop, but it'd be cute."

Famine laughed and grinned back. "Now, why would I do a thing like that?" He paused for a moment before quickly stooping and crushing a large handful of snow into a much rougher ball than War's, and sending it flying at her face. He had pretty good aim, as well.

She grinned. "'cause it saves you the effort of fighting back!"

War laughed as Famine retaliated and ducked, the snowball just skimming her head. She shook the snowflakes out of her hair and grabbed a few more handfuls of snow, packing them as quickly as possible, and winged one off in Famine's general direction as she worked on a pile of ammunition.

Famine dodged the hastilly thrown snowball easily and started packing his own snowballs, keeping one eye on the fort so that he could throw them the moment War showed her face.

Once she had a small pile, War listened for Famine's footsteps or the whisper of an impending snowball, but heard nothing. Not fool enough to show her head just yet, she lay on her stomach and dug into the wall in front of her, making a hole to spy out of.

Famine hovered not far from where he'd been when she threw the first snowball, one in each hand and a small pile at his feet. He knew better than to throw without knowing where she was, but when he saw the snow crumbling from a hole in the fort he lobbed one high into the air, hoping for it to come down on top of her.

The snowball made a pathetic pfff-ing noise as it landed a few feet to her left. War rolled her eyes and inched closer to the wall. "Nice shot," she called, sitting up and straddling the wall. "Let me make this a little easier for you!"

Famine threw the next snowball the moment War was in view. "What do you expect, I was throwing blind!" He immediately grabbed more ammunition the moment his hands were empty. He wasn't about to complain about her taunting, she had a fort and the high ground, he needed all the help he could get.

War ducked but ended up with snow splattered across her forehead and dripping into her eyes. "Getting better," she yelled. "Trying to get me to throw blind too?" She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and threw three tiny, hard-packed iceballs back in rapid succession.

Uriel decided to take a little break from his painting. He'd just finished his portrait of Michael and didn't feel like starting with Gabriel right away. Therefore, he put on a cloak over his robes -- even if some humans saw him, he didn't really care; they appeared to be all quite well informed on supernatural issues -- and headed outside. Maybe a bit of fresh air would do him good. (Of course he wasn't going to really breathe, but the sunlight that he hopefully would get outside would definitely be pleasant.) Then, after stepping out of the Manor, he started a slow walk over the snowy ground, oblivious to the small-scale war going on nearby.

Famine, completely unaware of the approaching angel, continues his war with....well, War. "Well, it certainly couldn't hurt!" He tried to dodge the ice balls and actually succeeded with the first...but then the next two hit him in the torso almost simultaniously. Were he human he'd have had the air knocked out of him, but fortunately he was not human and didn't strictly need to breathe. "Nice shot." He recovered quickly and threw a couple more snowballs her way.

Even War couldn't dodge everything that had been aimed at her through the millennia, including Famine's snowballs. She laughed as she took two to the chest, but stopped as the third hit her neck and began to melt down her coat. She dropped to her knees to shake her coat and shirt out and reload. Reaching for a fresh handful of snow, she spotted a newcomer out of the corner of her eye.

Angels always made wonderful targets.

She jerked her head in Uriel's direction and loosed off a barrage of snowballs at him, crossing every few seconds to fend off Famine.

Uriel was jerked out of his peaceful state as he felt a load of snowballs hitting him. Jumping aside, he resisted the urge to slip a dagger out of his sleeve and throw it at the attacker. He was just about to just turn around and return to the Manor, away from such childish games. Then, however, yet another snowball hit him, the others flying around him making it impossible for him to avoid them all.

For a moment Uriel just stood there, not doing anything. Then, however, with a growing sensation of dread, he felt something rising in his chest. More specifically, a giggle.

Then, the giggle bursted out, and he simply no more cared.

Glancing around, he saw a snow fortress from where the snowballs were seemingly coming from, and a glimpse of red head as his assaulter ducked. Aside from this, he saw a man-shaped creature that was definitely not a human, nor of demonic or angelic stock. A closer inspection brought up signs of Apocalypse, and he immediately could narrow the man's identity to one of only a few options. Add the thin but tidy appearance, and there was only one option -- Famine. Well, he would do just as well.

"Care for an ally?" he shouted at the man, scooping snow from the ground and starting to form a ball between his hands.

Famine laughed and gave Uriel a mock salute as he shouted back. "Thank you, that would be much appreciated!" He grinned and glanced back at the snow fort. "The enemy..." He threw another snowball in War's direction for emphasis. "...seems to have already claimed the higher ground. And built a fort before anyone else got here, which in my opinion is highly unfair." He grinned again and watched the fort carefully, waiting for War to appear again.

War grinned cheekily and folded her arms neatly on the snow fort's wall. "In addition to being better prepared, she's also a better shot than the two of you combined!" She ducked at the responding volley and lazily tossed a snowball back at both the angel and the other Horseman. "And as if that wasn't enough, all's fair et cetera ad nauseum."

Uriel rolled aside, his battle instincts from a few millennia's practice starting to work. Throwing a snowball at War's direction, he then smirked at Famine's direction. "Unfair, yes, it is," he said smoothly. "And, as an angel, I cannot accept unfairness, now can I?"

With this said, he took a closer glance at the snow fortress. It was indeed well built, steady, and all in all a good snow fortress. However, it had the weakness that all snow fortresses had.

To be exact, it was made of snow. And fire melted snow.

Uriel may not have been the angel of fire -- that was Michael's job -- but he was indeed named the Flame of God, and a hand holding a flame was his symbol. So, it was about the time to live true to his name.

Taking another handfull of snow, Uriel formed into a snowball. At first, it was just usual, but it turned into a very special snowball the moment he threw it. It flew through the air, not even aimed at War but instead at her fortress -- to be exact, at the base of the wall.

And it was on fire.

War heard the familiar sound of snow hitting snow, followed by something more alien: a soft hissing noise. She craned her head, searching for what was causing that, and squawked as she caught sight of the flaming snowball. An armful of snow ought to extinguish it, she thought as she piled some on top of it, but you can never tell. Sometimes angelic flames never smother.

She growled, louder than she needed to. "And you say I'm not fair!"

Famine gawked at the flaming snowball, and laughed as it impacted at the base of the wall. Even if she managed to put it out, the structural integrity of the wall would be compromised, and hopefully at somepoint they could bring it down, level the playing field a bit. Of course, when one of the combatants was War, the playing field was never level. He took advantage of her distraction to fling two more snowballs at her head.

Uriel smirked triumphantly as War tried frantically to put off the fire, only to be targeted by Famine. He let the fire go on for a while more, then put it off. Before she could attack, though, he wished for a couple of snowballs and threw them at her with all the skill he'd managed to gather from several millennia of practicing with his daggers.

Of course, he set them to melt immediately upon hitting a living target. Which meant that, upon being hit, War would also get very, very wet with icy cold water.

Well, that's what you get from starting a fight with an archangel.

Destruction felt the pull of his own outside. A minor destruction, but in this blanketed place where nerves jangled more than swords... he wandered outside to watch, lurking in a doorway.

A crumbling fortress... well, melting really. He sighed. In the old days he would've been there. He would have been in the fortress, within the ice itself, within the fire. There was still a temptation to go back. It would be.. so, so easy. To pick up the sword again. To go back to all the... all the chaos, and nuclear physics. He'd quit! That meant no... no...

But then he saw War's face. There was mischief and joy, and... She wasn't inciting violence in anyone. Well, except by thrwing snowballs at them. And that... well, it was something humans did, too - wasn't it? It didn't have to be... about work. His realm was doing fine on its own - and he more than anyone knew it was everywhere. He could never hope to escape it entirely. And really... why should he? He wasn't responsible for it anymore. That didn't mean he couldn't enjoy it.

Destruction stepped forward purposefully. Right into a very large snowball.

"So it's three on one now?" War yelled ecstatically, watching her snowball hit home. "Pretty bad odds, I think!"

Immediately after shaking off the snow from Famine's attack, War jerked from the force of Uriel's snowballs and screeched, feeling as if she'd been water-ballooned. She gasped as freezing water dripped down her face.

Shaking off like a dog, she ran both hands through her hair and tucked it into her coat to keep it out of her way. She quirked an eyebrow. "Nice invitation. You guys want me to come out, I'll come right on out."

Kicking over the front wall of the fort as she leapt out (it would do no good to abandon it only to have her opponents capture it), War ran down the hill, ruthlessly firing off what little ammunition she had in a wintry guerilla attack.

Destruction grinned and leaned down to grip the snow in his hands, face dripping. "Who said I'm not on your side, Red?" He yelled cheerfully, hurling the snowball at Famine with a practiced (and muscled) arm.

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