[OPEN] And a thankful strain...

[wintershepherd]

Characters: Jack Frost & OPEN
Date: Catch-all for November threads
Location: All over!
Situation: General prompts are in the post, prior discussed starters to be set up shortly! Message me if you want me to add a specific starter for your character or just tag in with any scene. Also all threads set after the end of the All Hallowed event end unless stated!
Special Note: Jack will have Baby Tooth with him unless noted otherwise and her visibility follows the UPDATED!! belief guidelines as Jack's do.
Warnings/Rating: TBA in threads if needed.


[ A. STORY TIME ] Keeliai Playground
To say things had been tumultuous lately was an understatement and the weekend afternoon found Jack in one of his usual haunts: a playground frequented by many kedan youngsters. Today he'd brought baggies of sliced fruit rather than his usual candied fare, though there were still an assortment of syrups to dip them into to mix and match the flavours. (He liked spoiling them but even he knew that they couldn't have an entire day of candy, and also Baby Tooth had line-faced at him until he'd decided fruit was fine.) Even now that the kedan children had gotten used to her, they still fawned over her and she adored everyone moment of it.

Here with the kids, things just seemed simpler.

Today he was recounting all the stories about King Arthur that he knew, acted out with voices and icy-formed props. Over the centuries he'd heard many versions and he was admittedly picking and choosing, based on his youthful audience. He'd already covered the miraculous pulling of Excalibur from the stone, the enigmatic Lady of the Lake and the powerful wizard Merlin, and was now mock-staging a battle against the terrible Black Knight. These were all new to the kedan, who drank the tales in with fascination and interjected questions that he didn't mind at all.

"And then King Arthur raised Excalibur high into the air and said, 'Lay down your sword, Black Knight! For Camelot is a kingdom of justice and fairness and if your heart is truly as dark as your armor, I will have no choice but to battle you!'"

The children crowded closer together, eyes wide and some even shifting colours in a physical reaction to their anticipation. Jack used his staff to mime a sword and changed his voice again, deep and rough, to suit the opposite character. 'Then we shall battle!' the Black Knight shouted back, and charged his horse into action!"

A swing of the spirit's staff and a burst of snow and ice crystals depicted a glowing, ghostly figure charging towards the group of children, only to leap over them and explode into sparkling flurries, while they shrieked happily at the display.

"And then..."

[ B. ELUSORY ] Various Locations
Baby Tooth was remarkably patient with her assistance as Jack slowly worked on figuring out how to become intangible and invisible at will. It made sense, he thought when he added in the context of the Guardians, because sight and belief were different things even if the rules of their world did link them. It was Jack and his unique situation that had melded them into one singular concept and now, three centuries after the fact, he was still struggling to disentangle them.

It made sense for spirits to sometimes need to hide, to do their work in secret. That was the thought that Jack kept fixed firmly in mind as he watched his hand become slightly hazy, before passing it through whatever solid object he was nearest to. A table, a rock, a signpost while Baby Tooth chirped encouragingly and applauded when he was finally able to do so without several minutes of concentration to build it up.

"Thanks Baby Tooth," he grinned. "How about we try the whole arm next?"

[ C. METACHROMATISM ] Wood Sector
( n. A change in color caused by variation of the physical conditions to which a body is subjected, especially such a change caused by variation in temperature. )

The first few times, he hadn't even realized he was doing it.

It wasn't unusual for Jack to fly lazy loops in and out of the Wood Sector trees, a small and sparse stand in for his usual forests but he took what he could get. There weren't exactly skyscrapers in Keeliai for him to weave about, so the low branches and curved trunks would have to do. But it wasn't until the third or fourth pass through the same area and absently noting the beginnings of orange and red to bloom on the leaves that he made the connection: he was instinctively starting Autumn.

That definitely gave him pause; that wasn't his season. He'd never had the urge to change the leaves to their fall colours before now, not when there were plenty of other spirits whose niche was precisely that. Is it because there are no other spirits here...?

So he might be found standing with a few leaves in his hands, examining them closely as though they held important secrets.

Comments

[baniichan]

Just as Barnaby had predicted, the giant mound of cake in Kotetsu's suite wasn't getting any smaller. While he certainly appreciated the trouble his partner went through to provide the treat, now that they had all these leftovers, all Barnaby could see was a pile money that was slowly rotting.

To make matters worse, it was money that could have been used to buy Kotetsu some actual clothing. Barnaby almost wished the man had waited a few more days before splurging on that leather jacket. Since they all got vouchers anyway, it seemed like Kotetsu had gone through a lot of trouble for nothing.

For now, though, there was little to be said on the subject that he hadn't already said. Instead, Barnaby could only patient wait on one of the quaint pieces of wooden furniture as Kotetsu got ready to show him his new winter coat.

It was taking a little longer than it should have, though. "You didn't get lost in your own house, did you?" Barnaby called.

[oyaji]

"No! I'm just--Hang on!" he shouted down to the first floor. Soon enough, though, Kotetsu came storming down his stairwell like thunder. He skipped the last two steps, opting to jump them with dramatic flair as he proudly presented his new outfit.

He found a pastel blue button down shirt, a pair of pants that still didn't fit him properly. But the real prize was his set of suspenders that he triumphantly snapped.

"What d'ya think? Pretty good-lookin' if I do say so myself!"

[baniichan]

Barnaby regarded Kotetsu for a moment. Since his pants weren't tailor made, it was no surprise that they didn't fit quite right. Aside from that, though, he looked polished enough, which was about all Barnaby could have asked for when it came to making sure his partner was presentable enough to go out in public.

"If you dress like that, people might actually think you're a responsible adult," Barnaby gently teased.

[oyaji]

"Exactly!" he agreed, even though he probably didn't hear the joke in his partner's words. Kotetsu was just too thrilled with them puppies to care. "I'm worldly now!" With another snap for posterity's sake, he strutted toward the kitchen.

"Hey, you hungry? I've got uhh..." He opened the wooden cabinets, only to find them completely bare. "Ehhh..." He went to his ice box and there sat the usual suspect. It was like a bad dream that wouldn't leave them alone. "Cake...?" Man, having no money really blew!

[baniichan]

Of course the joke seemed to fly right over the old man's head, but Barnaby didn't push the issue. As long as Kotetsu was pleased with his outfit, then there wasn't really any reason to. Besides, they had more pressing matters, like the fact they had to resort to cake if they wanted an actual meal.

Barnaby would have had some sympathy for his partner and his bare cupboards, except no money was usually the natural result of not having a job.

"Don't you think we should eat some actual food first?" he said with a sigh.

[oyaji]

"Unless you're hiding some in your house, I am totally out. What's wrong with cake? It's good!" In fact, Kotetsu already sliced himself off another piece. Sure, it was getting a little stale, but man! It was still damn delicious.

With his plate and fork, he took a seat by Barnaby. The plate barely touched the table as he shoveled in the sugary goodness. Actually, by this point, the cake was almost too much. He'd had it for leftovers so many times he was starting to get nauseated by the idea.

Ah well.

[baniichan]

"Oh, I don't know," Barnaby responded as he folded his arms over his chest. "Maybe its total lack of nutritional value? Or maybe the fact you don't exercise enough to shed the extra calories. Besides, if you only eat that, you're bound to get a stomach ache."

Surely Kotetsu didn't really need him to explain this to him.

"I know I said I'd help you eat it," he added, "but even I have my limits."

[oyaji]

"I don't always get a stomach ache," Kotetsu grumbled, but it was hard to be adamant about something that was so woefully true. Too much sugar before bed gave him really bad stomach pains in the night, and like hell was he in a good mood by the morning! Now even his partner was stepping down from their lofty goal.

"Well, what're we gonna do with it?" he whined, wallowing all over the back of his chair. He was lucky the sturdy piece of wood didn't snap right in half from those dangerous levels of petulance. "I'm not throwing it out! It cost way too much to just toss!" What to do? This was a hard one! With a huff, he threw himself dramatically onto the table. His dark arms splayed over the lacquered top, taking up as much space as they could.

In the silence--Well, it was hard to call it silence when there was a constant groaning sound emanating from the head on the table--he finally popped back up with a look. A look of utter genius! Aha!

"I got it!" Kotetsu shot up like a bullet ad rounded the kitchen to the big bay window carved out of the bark. "Doesn't this thing open?!" Okay, a little bit more elbow grease. Another hard shove and the window popped open.

"Hey! Heeey!" Leaning out of the window, he wrenched his head back and forth trying to remember which tree was the kid's. "Jack! You home? Hey! You want cake?"

[wintershepherd]

Jack was indeed home, though he didn't often hear himself being called through the walls of the treehouse. It takes him a moment to place the voice as that of his new neighbour but the words "you want cake" have him up out of his chair with a grin just a second later.

He's been practicing with Baby Tooth very hard to get this right and thinks the situation is a perfect opportunity to test out his progress: with a look of concentration, he becomes intangible and slowly, cautiously moves right through the wall into the other suite. Once he's there he seems to simply fade into existence again.

"Hey," he greeted, then noticed he was not the only one here. "Who's your friend? Is this your partner?"

Then to Barnaby, "Nice to meet you!"

[oyaji]

"He--Oww!" Ugh, his head! Where did that window frame come from?! Man, he was going to have a bruise on his head for a week! Gently this time, he turned out of the window to see that Jack was already in their house.

"Oh, so... You can do that too, huh?" Must be nice to be the Spirit of Winter, just wandering here and there as you pleased. "Oh--Right! Yeah, this is my partner, Bunny! Bunny, meet Jack! Don't worry, he'll help us out with our problem."

[baniichan]

"Huh?" Barnaby blinked in confusion. Eyes darting between Kotetsu and the empty space he just addressed, he realized he couldn't make anymore sense of it all than he could 5 seconds ago. There...wasn't anyone there, and yet his partner was acting like someone had just strolled right through the wall.

It was so convincing that Barnaby half wondered if his partner ought to join a theater group once they got back home.

"If this is supposed to be some kind of joke, old man, it's not very funny," he said with a frown instead.

[wintershepherd]

Jack on the other hand, knew exactly what was wrong as soon as he saw Barnaby's confused expression and turned back to Kotetsu. "Your partner's not exactly in the believing camp," he explained. "Remember when I said not everyone can see me, like you couldn't at first? Some can't even hear me either."

[oyaji]

"Yeah, well, he didn't have much of a childhood," Tiger explained as quietly as possible. He even remembered to put a hand over his mouth as he said it this time!

"Uhh, so we just have to make him believe right...? Okay! Uhh, so, Bunny! There's this... What happened was... .... Let me try again. I met a spirit--Well, the spirit of winter. Pretty cool, right? Eh, but! The problem is, most people can't see him 'cause they don't believe?" Was that... correct? Well, whatever! He was new to this supernatural stuff!

"So, you just have to believe in him and you'll see him! Simple!"

[baniichan]

Kotetsu seemed completely serious about all of this, even if he wasn't the most eloquent about it. And though Barnaby would waved off anyone else, Kotetsu was hardly just anyone.

"So, in other words, you're saying there's a third person in here I can't see, but you can," he summarized.

The full implications of that set in, and Barnaby suddenly looked troubled. "Are you feeling all right?"

[wintershepherd]

Jack perched casually on the end of the table, one leg hooking around his staff as he waited for Kotetsu to try and explain. "He can't be that old," the spirit commented idly. "I mean what, mid-20's? No offense Tiger but if you could hear me pretty much off the bat, this scenario's a little backwards."

Then he considered something. "Tiger and Bunny, I'm kind of sensing a theme here. I can't call him Bunny though, I already know a Bunny."

[oyaji]

Tiger stared at his partner like he just got on all fours and started barking. "W-What?" Wow, should he be offended by that? Right now, he was too confused. Possibly shocked? Eh. Maybe it could turn to offense? Or, maybe just annoyance. He'd stick with good ol' defensiveness! "Of course! Because I'm old, I must be senile too?!"

With an insufferable glance to Jack at what he had to deal with, he realized it was weird for the forty year old to be the one so easily swayed. "What can I say, I'm young at heart!" Eternal youth as a blessing and a curse apparently. Barnaby had been an adult since he was two. Tiger was still trying to fill those big shoes.

"Oh ho ho, really? Ha! Bunny! Bunny, he has a friend named Bunny too! See? Great minds think alike, eh?" Oh yeah, that was a smug smile on his face.

[baniichan]

"No, no one is saying you're senile," Barnaby countered, clearly exasperated. "You're the one talking to invisible people. Stop acting like I'm suddenly being unreasonable."

Maybe he'd finally gotten food poison from that cake. Not that it was that old, but with such weird ingredients, who knew how long it took for that stuff to actually go bad?

"Are you sure you're feeling okay?" he pressed, growing more concerned. "No sick stomach or a fever? I'm being serious, you know." A beat. "And for the record? Please don't introduce me as 'Bunny' to people. It honestly makes you sound weird."

He was only saying all of this for Kotetsu's own good.

[wintershepherd]

"Hold up there, he never said anything about senile," Jack protested. "Besides, I'm literally like ten times older than you, Tiger. Age has nothing to do with it... if anything, I think it's kind of something special that it didn't take much for you to believe in me."

His attention swung back to Barnaby then, making a slow circuit around the blonde as though to get a better look at him. A draft of cold air moved with him but other than that, his bare feet made no sound.

"I don't think it makes you sound weird," he tossed offhandedly to Kotetsu. "Ask him what he prefers to be called then."

[oyaji]

"You can call him Barnaby--And I'm feeling fine!" he answered back just as exasperated. How else was he supposed to explain this that didn't make him sound deranged? At least Jack thought it went beyond mentally unstable--Although, the word special was kind of ambiguous. Okay, no, this was getting him nowhere! He needed a new tactic! Logic time! As Jack paced around his partner, Tiger stroked the scruff on his chin to gather ideas.

"Look, I swear I'm not making this up! I met him when those Kedan dumped me outside my new home. He's my neighbor, Jack. You know, Jack Frost? You guys have him, right?" Tiger hadn't grown up with that little legend, but he had certainly heard of it from songs and Christmas commercials. "Anyway, he's... real--Like, really real! You just have to believe he exists and you'll be able to see him too!"

[baniichan]

Barnaby instinctively turned his collar against the cold air Jack brought with him, but didn't spare him another glance.

"Jack Frost," he echoed. "You do realize I've almost never gotten into the whole 'holiday cheer' thing, right? It's not like I know much about those stories outside of what I've heard in passing."

Clasping his hands between his knees now, he regarded Kotetsu with a long stare. He knew his partner wasn't lying. An entity called Jack Frost was indeed here, if Kotetsu's sincerity was anything to go by. But Barnaby still didn't completely understand what any of that meant.

"So you're saying the spirit of winter is here," he slowly added in an attempt to sort through this whole mess. "Does that mean other spirits are here too?"

[wintershepherd]

"I'm the only one here at the moment," Jack answered trusting that Kotetsu would relay the information. "Bunny was here for a little while in the spring but he went home again," he added.

He moved towards the nearest window and said, "Hey Tiger, tell him to watch over here," before pressing his hand to the glass. Icy curls began to form on the surface.

[oyaji]

To Barnaby, he said, "Uhh, apparently his Bunny was here for awhile, but then he--Waaait! Are you talking about the Easter Bunny?!" Wow, yeah even Kotetsu was having a hard time believing in the that one. The embodiment of a natural season, sure, that was basically Japan's religion. A rabbit that had nothing to do with the whole Christian religious holiday thing? Whole different thing!

Well, since he wasn't hear anymore, Tiger didn't have to deal with that mindfuckery.

"Oh, Bunny! Look! Look what Jack's doing to the window! See? I told you there's someone else here!"

[baniichan]

Well, it's not like this was the weirdest thing he'd heard all month. Waking up on the back of a giant turtle had a way of putting things into perspective, apparently. Granted, the Easter Bunny thing was a bit much, although Barnaby was pretty sure it didn't warrant squawking as loud as Kotetsu had.

Before Barnaby could remind his partner to use his inside voice, though, his attention was directed toward the window.

"Ice ferns," he observed as he watched the distinctive leaf-like shapes blooming across the glass. There was something strangely nostalgic about them, perhaps buried behind some long-forgotten memory. Regardless, the ice ferns formed quickly, too controlled to be anything but deliberate. Not that it was terribly shocking, with how insistent Kotetsu was being about all of this--

And, then, as soon as Barnaby blinked, he saw a pale hand pressed against the window's surface. Moments ago there'd been nothing but empty space, but now a young man stood before him.

Raising his eyebrows in muted surprise, he met the boy's gaze.

[wintershepherd]

Jack turned back just as Barnaby blinked and the blonde's gaze was focused directly on him now; the spirit had done this enough times to be able to see (and almost, strangely, feel) the difference. He smiled and nodded at him.

"Hey, there we go. A little demonstration goes a long way, huh?"

[oyaji]

"Huh... That was pretty fast," he remarked, watching the way Barnaby's eyes grew bigger when recognition finally kicked in. Then it occurred to him what that meant, when Jack told him how quickly he had caught on for an adult, and a satisfied grin broke out over his face. "Guess you're more childish than I thought!"