Rock the Dragon - Jygust 31st ET (TW Chapter 3 side thread)

[Ashari]

"Moving it it is,"' Fangwyrd said with a nod. "I'm going to tell you now, it's not as easy as you might think. This fireball, it's not like some leather ball you might've played with as a kid with your little pointy eared pals." A subtle jab about being a pointy eared biped aside, Fang meant well in his description and continued. "You can't just give it the force of a swift boot or a toss. It's much more complicated than that."

In this way, Fangwyrd decided he needed to show rather than tell. Wiggling his claws over the small fire he'd maintained he pulled the strands into his fist and when he opened his hand there was a swirling mass quite like the one that Haikan was tenderly cradling. Fangwyrds was darker, more intense in color than his pupil's. Haikan's fireball was mostly yellow and orange, while the dragon's was dark orange and red. It wasn't as stark as the one that Haikan had accidentally made, but, there was an obvious strength to Fangwyrd's creation that Haikan hadn't mastered.

"It's pretty unlikely that you'll burn anything to the ground tonight... I'd be surprised if you can even get the ball rolling." Whether it was an intentional goading or one done without thought such comments had a way of inspiring a person into proving the other wrong. Fangwyrd gave a coy look in his large, gleaming ember eyes. "To move a fireball, it's good to get into a comfortable position."

At this Fangwyrd stood up on his short little hind legs and put one foot in front of the other to put his body at a slight angle. He held the fireball behind him and pointed his nose toward nothingness (as far as Haikan could tell) though there was something impeding the air energy from moving around about fifteen paces ahead of him. It was a solid mass of energy, extremely slow moving (to the point of not moving at all so far as Haikan could judge). The fireball was in line with his head and he curled his talons. "Watch carefully, I'll do it as slow as I can," Fang said.

Taking in a breath he pushed his hand forward, and as he did so the ball sucked in a bunch of air energy strands - except they weren't brought in at all, but pushed to the back of it sandwiched between Fang's scaled hand and the fiery orb. The energies swirled and heated super fast which propelled the flame forward. It shot ahead and then hit the solid mass of energy (a large rock) where they broke apart and were sent in all different directions where they faded and sputtered out. A number of red particles remained on the rock glittering and sparkling. "Your turn."

[Haikan]

The captain twitched his own ears as Fang mentioned his pointy-eared friends. Until Mikail, he never actually had a pointy-eared friend, but now was hardly a time for thinking of such things. This particular pointy-eared biped had to figure out how to pull air into his fireball and do just what Fangwyrd did. What was more, he absolutely could not fail, because Fang didn't seem to have faith in him. It was up to Haikan to make sure that such a thing didn't happen again.

"All right, prepare yourself," Haikan, because you're going to do this right! Pull air in from the front and squeeze it out the back... Stop it with your hands... That's what happened, right? Argh! I wish he'd explained it alongside the visual, but at least he did it as slow as he could... Alright, I can do this! It's show time!

Haikan closed his eyes and focused the best he could. When he opened them, he slowly stood, and placed his left foot behind his right foot with his weight primarily on his left- his favorite fighting pose, the counter position. If something went awry, he intended to be fully able to leap out of death's way.

With the reddish glow of the fire reflecting in his determined green eyes, a yellow middle-tone was created and perhaps his eyes might have resembled the fire in his hands and in his heart. He slowly moved his right hand to the top of the ball to balance the energies, and he even more slowly moved his hands from in front of him, to behind him and to his left. My target is that rock. My ammunition is the air and fire energy in my hand. My fuel is the air energy between that rock and myself... Time to shine.

The captain took his right hand from atop the ball and he reached forward to grab a few of the strands of air energy, taking the initiative to get them moving. He reversed his mental wick to inwardly pull the air energy this time, instead of attempting to push it through him.

He simultaneously thrust his left hand forward, fully extending his arm with his palm facing the rock, and he pulled back his right hand and his wick, as he mentally yanked the air to suction quickly in through the front of the fireball. He then clapped his hands together behind the ball and opened them outwards, creating a wall of flesh, and he then did something that he inferred rather than saw. He reversed the wick in his mind again, this time to push the air energies that were behind him, into the ones that were coming back towards him, so that he would create a squeezed buildup just like the one he saw behind Fang's fireball. Three beads of sweat rolled down his cheek and down onto his neck, and his eyebrow was twitching from the involuntarily serious face he was making.

"Alright! Here we go!!"

[Ashari]

As Haikan's hands came together and spread he could feel the growing energy between the fireball and his palms. The more air energy that was pulled into the vacuum the more the fireball wanted to jet away from him. It was actually more work to contain it than it was to encourage the air cords into weaving into the empty space. Once they were there they spun and whirled against one another, creating another small whirlwind that was meant to propel the orb ahead.

More and more energy was pulled in until Haikan was sweating. His face pulled into an awkward visage of concentration and seriousness, but when he finally released the orb that would subside. His fireball flew through the air in the direction of the one that Fangwyrd had released. However, much like a football being tossed by a youngster, his creation wobbled and swayed, turning visibly end over end and losing momentum in the process. It arced and landed a few paces from the rock and sputtered out of existence as the springs of energy bounced away and lost their collective power.

Fangwyrd jumped up in the air. "You did it!" He announced and gave a short gallop over on four paws toward Haikan to pushed against his calf with his bony head in a playful head butt. "Well, I mean to say, you pretty much got it. You could use some practice aiming, but.. that takes time, like anything else." The small dragon took a step back and pulled himself onto his hindquarters and then stood up on his back legs, crossing his arms over his scaled chest. "Might be easier aiming at something easier to spot..." he mused and his bright eyes drifted off to where he could still see the small particles of energy on the rock and ground. "I have an idea, you stay here and work on making yourself another fireball."

With that, the small creature flopped back down onto four paws and frisked off into the white abyss of energy toward the dark spot. His spaded tail flicked back and forth as he trotted through the high grass, giving little jumps here and there when the mood came to him. He climbed onto the rock until he was seated comfortably on it's apex of height - a little plateau on the top where he perched on his haunches. "How's it going?" He called.

[Haikan]

Haikan remained in his firing position after he shot, merely staring in awe and wonder at what he'd managed to do. This was still the very same day that he looked into the aether for the very first time, and it wasn't hard to be swept up in the rush of successfully performing magick. After Fang ran up to him and congratulated him, he lowered his arms and turned toward Fang, laughing and cheering.

"Ha hahaha! Yeah! I did it, but it's all thanks to you!" The adhiel was overjoyed, but he still didn't want to get cocky just yet. He clearly needed work on his technique, but practice makes perfect, right? Alright, I'll make twice the fireball I made last time. And I'll do my best to aim it just right! Remembering how much denser and more powerful-looking Fang's fire was than Haikan's, he figured that maybe he could work on weaving his energy more effectively.

"Yes noble Fangwyrd, I'll remain here and make an even better fireball than last time." His face grew a bit serious again, and he closed his eyes to rehearse in his mind what he was going to do, and how he was going to make it better. When he opened them, he reached out for the wind energy again, but this time he put his primary focus on maintaining the wind energy in his grasp- so far the air energy's slipperiness was the primary difficulty, so he might as well get nimble fingers for the stuff.

Whirling energy cords in the palm of his right hand, he allowed several flickers for it to gain speed and power, and he tried his best to contain it. He then reached out similarly to last time and grabbed a few cords from the fire. More energy, and stronger... He clasped the imaginary hilt with his left hand and unsheathed the fire's energy again, pulling it into his grasp. Similarly to last time, he then moved his right hand underneath the fire energy to catch it in the whirlwind, and he even added a few magick words. "I can do this!"

He pulled as much air and fire energy as he could to make the fire stronger, at least strong enough to sustain itself (and hopefully not fizzle out like last time). His serious expression at last melted away and was replaced with a goofy smile. "Alright Fangwyrd! Doing well over here, I- ..Fangwyrd?"

In the time he spent building his fireball, the adhiel neglected to look up even for a flicker. He completely lost track of where Fang was, and had no idea what was going on around him. He looked around with a puzzled look on his face, he hoped he could spot the dragon before he made too much a fool of himself. "I'm ready for the next step, master Fangwyrd.."