.(i'm not crazy); just going insane

[Ginny Weasly]

He had been about to try and persuade his father. Maybe even beg, he really wanted to go, before they'd been interrupted. Now Cody scowled, "Hey! Leave that kid alone! He didn't do nothing!" He stomped a foot angrily, "Stupid cats!"

He didn't know why these cat-humans made him so mad. They just did, he guessed. He gritted his teeth with anger, "Stupid cats." he repeated. He looked to the little boy, his face showing something like compassion, "They're just dumb old oversized kitties. Be your mom has one! Pull it's whiskers, bet it'll scream!" He glanced over to the cats, grinning rather scarily, "Bet it'll cry like anything else. Stupid cats."

Still, he kept near his dad, holding his hand tightly, even as he taunted the others.

[Xaver]

Both pairs of large, hazel eyes widened, pupils narrowing to slits at Cody's outbursts. The boy raised his hands above his head, and swatted, but the male that held him squeezed, and though the effort from him seemed almost easy, he had the boy in such a powerful vice that bones snapped in a series of crunches, beneath his hold. The boy's arms dropped, and his eyes rolled back into his head, and he bagan to twitch, though subconsciously, fighting for air.

"Stupid cats..?" the one nearest Cody and Xaver hissed. "Better than stupid. Oversized. Birds."
He looked at Cody.
"I know you bleed like everything else. ...And we do cry, yes, little one. Ask your father. We do cry-"

Xaver's reaction was too quick for the cat to even notice it. Without dropping Cody's hand, he brought his other elbow up, and into the male's chin, snapping his head back, then instantly down, driving his arm forcefully down into his neck. The werecat crumpled to the floor, eyes still open, and glossy - completely still.

"You killed him..."
A woman covered her mouth with her hand, as the whispers quickly spread, like a flood, throughout the now completely silent room.

The werecat holding the boy tapped his fingers over the child's arm, fingernails curled into claws, the sharpness of the points drawing dark rivulets of blood. He grinned, and the pair vanished, even as the boy's mother lunged for them.

"You killed him!"
The woman was screaming now.

Xaver shook his head.
Panic was setting into the crowd.

"Out of here. Let's go, Cody. Now."

[Ginny Weasly]

Cody looked back at the boy's mother, biting his lip, "But..shouldn't we help him? Her?" He was overcome by an enormous sense of guilt suddenly. He froze as he realized that it had been his fault the boy had been hurt. His fault. he was the cause.

He swallowed, not able to look away from the mother crying over her son.

[Xaver]

Xaver stopped, in trying to rush Cody out of the mass of confused people, and reached down, curling his fingers about Cody's jaw, and turning his face toward him.
"I know where he is going."
His tones were very quiet. Very solemn. Very dark, though the gentle, paternal affection was still there. The worry.
"I won't stop until I find him. And demons in hell, when I do..."

Xaver tugged Cody's hand, and ducked out of the crowd, gently leading him out into the busy street.

"I know what you are thinking, my son. Don't do so - he would have harmed him with or without your words, or reason."

[Ginny Weasly]

Cody was pulled along, but his feet felt heavy. He was shaking slightly, trembling. He clutched Xaver's hand tightly, swallowing around a large lump in his throat.
He heard his father's words, but didn't believe him. He knew it was his fault. And if the boy died, that would be his fault too.

Finally, he managed to speak, "Where are they?"

[Xaver]

Xaver took one glance at Cody, and his heart thudded in a heavy, bruising new rythm against his ribs. He bent down, and scooped his son up in his arms in one fluid movement, even as he continued to walk, wrapping one arm beneath the boy's rump, and the other across his back, cradling him in the circle of his arms, against his chest. It was so easy to forget Cody's youth and actual age, when he acted so much older, and mature all the time. In the same situation, his own father would have cursed, chided, and perhaps even swung at him in reprimand, for any outburst or any foolish, child's mistake.
That was the difference in the men - Xaver instead held Cody tightly to him, having no blame or anger for any other than the werecats, themselves.
He found it interesting, on some odd level, however, that Cody found it more disturbing he might be responsible for an innocent's pain, than Xaver killing another. It was as confusing as it was outrageous - but Xaver didn't particularly want to push it, on any count.

"They are," he said quietly, "where the probably came from. Their own territory. Their own realm. The one my realm - our realm - has had no peace with for years, now."

[Ginny Weasly]

Cody held onto his father tightly, his pale features even paler as he listened to Xaver.
"They...are you going after them?" Cody turned his eyes on Xaver, frowning, his eyes dark with a sudden firmness, and wide with fear.

Cody thought of the boy, and swallowed again, "Dad..." He struggled with what he was about to say, "Don't go alone. They'll hurt you." And that'll be my fault too, Cody thought the last part. His thoughts weren't protected by any barriers, the only people close enough to him with the power to read minds was his parents, and they never let on.

He thought of the werecats and shivered, against his will. He didn't particularly mind cats. Normal, nice, pretty, domestic ones. They had always been indifferent to him as well, but now he thought of cats completely differently.

[Xaver]

"I must. That boy is no older than you, yourself are - and he is more or less powerless to them. I know where they are going - and it would be wrong of me, to not at least try, follow."

Xaver heard Cody's worries, but made no mention, nodding slowly, once, to himself, even as he continued through the street, Cody wrapped firmly in his embrace.

"The quicker I get to him, the more likely I can bring him back." Alive...- he left out.
Xaver knew he would be able to find the child.
His matter of physical state, however - that, the Fallen lord could not guarentee.
"I may have some help. But no one really knows the Cats, like I do."

He left it hanging, at that.


Once out of the enormous crowd, he began to pull energies - and with never stopping, he transported them, the world about them disfiguring, then mutating back into their familiar home, in Xaver and Ginny's room. He swept a kiss across Cody's brow, then set the boy down onto the bed, tugging the casual shirt over his head, and tossing it aside, though the shirt never landed - it shattered into a million foamy pieces, then disappeared with a whisper of magic, to appear in its dirty whole in the laundry basket downstairs. He shifted, now, the naked hard, sculpted musculature of his torso bunching, and pulling, as he bent and quickly drew open and closed drawer after drawer, searching.

Finally, he reached in the bottom drawer, pulling out a blue, satiny shirt of foreign fabric. He slipped into it, but didn't bother to button it down, bare flesh beneath the open slit. He pried his fingers into the hidden breast pocked of the shirt, and withdrew a very small, perhaps finger-long sized whistle, made of a very light, bleached wood. He stowed it into the pocket of his jeans as he closed the drawer with the heel of his boot, then he made to the closet, sliding open the doors with a barely restrained haste.

[Ginny Weasly]

Cody watched his dad, his worry and unease growing in his chest. He fidgited, wanting to beg his dad to take him with him. But he said nothing, just made small noises of unease.

And then Ginny was at the doorway to the bedroom, a basket of clean clothes on her hip. Her eyesbrows jumped as she saw them, and she watched Xaver for a moment. "What's going on?" She asked, walking into the room and setting the basket beside Cody. She looked down at her son, patting his head, and looking at Xaver.

"Is something wrong?"

[Xaver]

Xaver didn't pause when Ginny entered the room - knowing she was there, for he could feel her presence, without her having to even say a word. He bent into the closet, and when he straightened, in one hand was a faded pair of dark outdoor boots, and in the other a long, black dyed-leather sheathed sword, it's length about up to his middle. He leaned the sword against the wall, kicked off his dress shoes, and hiked the boots on, pulling his jeans over them as the laces tied themselves. He lifted the sword again, and untied the long strap, then shouldered it, diagonal across his back.

"There was a mixup in town, Baby. They took a kid. I'm leaving early."

Xaver looked anything but pleased about it, but as he turned, and faced them, he tried for a reassuring expression.

"I'll be back as soon as I can, Love. Hopefully by early morning, like I said earlier. Then I can run out and get those groceries for you - we didn't have time."
He moved to her, and drew a hand up, cupping the side of her face, and catching her gaze for a moment, before he pressed a gentle, but loving kiss over her lips. He swooped down, after, and planted another atop Cody's head.

"Don't you worry, Xerxes," he said firmly, meeting the boy's eyes.
"I'll find him."

Without a breath, or even a stir of magic, he was gone.

[Ginny Weasly]

Cody swallowed around a lump in his throat and looked down at his hands. He started to shake, then started to cry. Ginny, who had naturally been surprised since the beginning, sat on the bed next to Cody, putting her arms around him.
"Hush, angel...what happened?"

Cody clung to her, "Momma...they took a little boy! They hurt him! And daddy went after them..."

"Shuush, honey. It's okay, dad will take care of the people who took the little boy." Ginny rubbed his back, planting a kiss in the same spot Xaver just had.

"Not people. Cats."

[Xaver]

Xaver appeared in a very small room, the walls white-washed, and the floor of a light grey tile, the only light coming in from what remained of the sunset, filtering through the glass of the dome that made the entire ceiling. The room was completely empty, save for a red-cushioned, tiny child's chair, upturned, and tossed into the corner. Xaver blinked at the chair, sucking in a breath as the magic of the transport caught up to him, and readjusting the band that strapped the sword across his back. He went to the nearest wall, and trailed his fingers along it, almost absently, until he found a very small grove - he pressed it, and the wall gave way.
He closed the door behind himself, making little sound as he padded down the stone hallway, running a hand through his thick, obsidian hair.

"You're early."

Xaver closed his eyes, stopping.

"Didn't think you'd make it back so early, my lord. What changes?"


Xaver turned his head slightly, gaze taking in the sight of one of his Fallen, suited up in the near weightless armor their craftsmen were now selling.
"Everything."

[Ginny Weasly]

"Cats?" Ginny furrowed her brow, confused at first, then understanding. Of course. If there were bird-people, there had to be cat-people. It's just how things were.

Cody nodded, though, "And they came into the shop...and they grabbed a little boy and took him."

"Shhhh, honey." Ginny said, hurrying to sooth her terrified son. But he wouldn't have any of it. He cried, and cried, muttering about how it was his fault.

"No, baby. It isn't. I promise you."

[Xaver]

-later-


It was done.
The child was with his mother. Bruised, beaten, and he couldn't remember the last month - but he was alive. He would recover.
Xaver hadn't sustained much injury, himself, in fetching him.
Nothing time won't heal, he reassured himself.
The kid was home.
His work was done.
And, after he'd hobbled into the meeting he had set up, and was over an hour late to, and after he'd been caught falling asleep twice - the board sent him home.

It was done..

It had to be done.
He didn't think his body could endure anything else.

The shopping would have to wait, he thought idly, as he appeared in the well-kept living room. The lights were off, and he didn't hear anything. ...Ginny and Cody were probably asleep. He hoped they were. He'd feel even worse, if they had been waiting up all night for him.

Catching the time at barely past four in the morning on the clock above the fireplace, Xaver sighed, drawing in a deep, threaded breath, and letting out with a low grunt of pain. Slowly, he stripped, kicking off his boots, and tearing off the shredded remains of his shirt, tossing his socks on top, and torn, stained jeans after them. In his boxers, he knelt, wings expanding behind him, then folding around his figure as stretched out on the floor, before the fireplace, the dying flames in the hearth illuminating the dark, protesting bruises that littered his body, and the very last of the scrapes that had already been to work in healing themselves. He tucked his head into the crook of his elbow, damp raven hair splaying across the sinews of his strong forearm - he'd showered in his realm before he'd returned, but hadn't been able to change..
Sleep, carried him off within seconds.

[Ginny Weasly]

Cody hadn't wanted to be alone. He was too afraid, too scared. So Ginny had asked him to sleep in her bed, with her, under the pretense that "she wanted his protection." Cody had agreed, knowing she wasn't really in need of protection from anything. He agreed because he was afraid.
He had fallen asleep hours ago, sleeping deeply and peacefully, hardly moving. Except to stick his thumb in his mouth, and to clutch the blankets tighter.

Ginny had slept, but off and on, never really out for more than 10 or 20 minutes. Always checking on Cody, and always pushing his hair out of his face before drifting off again. She hoped Xaver would be there in the morning. She hoped nothing would keep him.
And, as she saw two hours after he had come home, nothing had. She had gotten up at six, finally annoyed with the sporadic sleeping. Dawn was starting as she walked softly from her room, leaving Cody in the mess of blankets and pillows, still sucking his thumb.
She almost tripped over Xaver.

She knelt down, placing a hand on his shoulder and gently shaking him.
"Baby? Why don't you go to bed? Cody's sleeping there."