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1x1x1x1 was sat firmly on what she had long since declared as her thinking stump just a bit away from the killers’ mansion, which she’d clawed to hell and back many a times in the countless days since she’d gotten here.
In one set of her hand-talons she delicately held a little wooden carving of a bird.
Again, undeservedly, Taph had forgiven her. Despite everything.
It was getting annoying. Could Taph please just hate her so she could get rid of this writhing guilt?
She was jolted out of her thoughts by the sound of a scream, and at once she was on the move. She knew who screamed like that. She knew whose voice that was. She swore, if anything–
As she sprinted into the clearing in front of the killers’ mansion, Venomshank summoned into the talons that weren’t holding the carving, she felt herself visibly relax.
Oh. It was fine. It wasn’t a scream of fear, or of pain.
Apparently, somehow, Kidd had dragged everyone but her into a snowball fight.
The scream was rather a scream of victory, Kidd standing firmly atop a dark shape collapsed into the snow that 1x realized with a barely held back laugh was Sonnellino, the mafia man having fallen so hard that the rabbit ears he normally kept hidden and tucked into his coat were untucked, splayed across the snow by his head.
She quickly made her way to the porch after she de-summoned Venomshank to peer inside for a moment, setting the carving down before she stepped back out, overlooking what was happening.
Slasher was off to the side, clearly trying very hard to explain a snowball fight to Doe, who very obviously was not in a lucid state of mind currently, meaning Slasher was attempting to explain a snowball fight to a beast.
Speaking of beasts, Sixer was stalking around a certain jester-like divine, a mischievous look on her face as 1x could see her setting up to pounce Noli directly into a snowbank.
Now, 1x could have warned Noli, yelled out a quick “LOOK OUT!”
But where would be the fun in that?
Noli noticed 1x, and the look he gave her was so disgustingly affectionate she almost wanted to push him into the snowbank herself.
And that’s what Sixer took as an opportunity, letting Noli get out the first note of a greeting before it slammed its body into him, throwing him into a snowbank.
“A-” came the muffled yelp of surprise, and Noli quickly dug himself out, looking at 1x like a kicked puppy, “X!!!!! Y0U C0U1D H4V3 W4RN3D M3!! 7R4I70R!!”
“Sorry, Noli, them’s the breaks!”
Sixer laughed a loud crackling laugh, perching up on his hind legs before he fell onto his back, pawing at his face as he tried to calm himself from how hilarious he clearly found the sight.
Only for, nearly immediately, an entire chunk of snow to get chucked at his face.
1x blinked at the size of it, and turned to see Slasher with his hands in the air in victory, and Doe blinking at his snow-coated claws. Slasher had managed to get the corrupted man in on the snowball fight. Impressive.
1x slowly leaned down and folded a snowball together, staring at a certain someone who was still celebrating a victory over a downed opponent. She crept just a little closer, target in her sights like the deadly creature she was, not a sound made, not even the crunching of snow.
And then, all at once, she beaned Kidd in the back of the head with a snowball.
The brood parasite made a strange sort of distress call 1x had rarely heard and faceplanted in the snow.
She froze, watching him. Had…had she hurt him? Had she hurt one of the few things she never wanted to hurt? He was…he was shaking.
Void below, what did she just–
Kidd suddenly pulled his head from the snow with uproarious laughter, skittering away from where he’d felled Sonnellino [who was now pulling himself up, readjusting his hat but not bothering to tuck his ears back in] to get a vantage point on a rock, eyes now locked onto 1x.
Oh. Thank everything. She didn’t hurt him. The shaking was laughter.
He suddenly bounded back at her and she leapt out of the way, suddenly receiving a quickly chucked snowball directly to the chest. She sputtered and started to fall back, frantically flapping her wings to try to keep her balance. Kidd took advantage of that, then outright tackling her into a snowbank like Sixer had done to Noli.
“GOTCHA!” he giggled, “THAT’S FOR THE CHEAP SHOT!”
“Says Mr. Cheap Shot himself!” Sonnellino was brushing himself off a bit away, a good-natured smile on his face, “You’re the one who hit me in the back of the head!”
“AALLL’SSSS FFFFAIR I N LLLOVE AAAAND WWWA R!” Sixer suddenly shouted immediately before she battered Noli into another snowbank, earning another whine from the half-decayed divine who could very easily put up much more of a fight than he was currently putting up.
When he looked to 1x with that stupid look again, she immediately knew what he was doing.
That sappy idiot.
Kidd skittered back away from 1x, running over to literally run circles around Doe, who made various snuffling noises as he attempted to keep up with the much younger, much more energetic combatant. 1x took the opportunity to get up, heading over to where Noli was and yanking him out of the snowbank, much to his delight.
And that’s when she outright picked him up and threw him into a different snowbank.
“7̵̡͒R̴̞̃4̴̧͝I̸̦̋7̴̯͗0̴̛̖R̸̳͑!̷͚͆!̸̠̏!̴͖̏!̵̧͌!̷̙̆!̸̡͆!̴̦̊” his voice crackled as he dragged himself out, “Y0U’R3 50 M34N! Y0U BU11Y M3 4ND F0R WH47?!”
“Because sometimes you’re really easy to bully,” 1x stuck her tongue out at him.
She immediately found herself pelted with snowballs as Noli shouted crackling glitchy joking anger, and she ran to the side to dodge around them, thinking about how stupid this all was in such a funny way. Here she was, the personified hatred of War, and yet she was having a snowball fight. Telamon would be disappointed, and a part of her was proud of that.
She dodged around a hit from Sonnellino, and scooped up enough snow to plaster it nearly directly on Slasher’s face as she ran past him. The hit she didn’t dodge, however, was the one from Kidd, who was now perched on top of Doe as a vantage point.
“WRETCHED LITTLE BEAST!” she yelled with a laugh [trying to ignore how she remembered hearing someone yell that same thing at her in the same affectionate tone], tossing a snowball that aimed a little too low and splattered against Doe’s face, leaving him blinking in surprise as Kidd darted off him, laughing like a little imp.
1x gave chase again across the clearing, suddenly finding herself with the instinct to raise her wing to block another attempted hit from Sonnellino [seriously, how did they consider this guy deadly if he was missing this much?], much to her own surprise, ending in her skittering to a stop.
She’d always kept her wings tucked so close to her body. She couldn’t fly, they were just for show.
But yet, earlier, she had used them to try to stop herself from falling. And just now, she’d used one as a shield.
…Interesting.
She was snapped out of her thoughts just in time to duck and avoid a snowball from Noli, and she cackled at him as she scooped up enough snow to send him tumbling backwards and falling flat on his back.
“I AM A GOD ABOVE YOU!” she roared at him, wings suddenly spread [though she’d dare not try to fly, she did love the idea of looking bigger right now], “LOOK UPON ME!”
She looked across the clearing, seeing everyone staring at her, wide-eyed in awe…though she did catch the way Sonnellino was looking at her, like he was waiting for something like this and was proud of it, even if it was just for fun during a snowball fight.
“EVEN CHAOS BOWS TO MY WHIM!” she not-too-harshly stamped a set of foot-talons down onto Noli, who dramatically threw his head back with the back of his wrist to his forehead, like this was part of a stage play, “LOOK UPON ME AND KNOW THAT I STAND AS THE MOST POWERFUL OF YOU ALL! KNOW THAT I–”
…Wait. Someone was missing from the audience. Someone who should’ve been impossible to miss.
A shadow eclipsed over her.
…Uh oh.
Before she could dart out of the way, Sixer dropped a massive amount of snow directly onto her, sending her falling down onto Noli with an indignant squawk like an offended chicken.
“G0d 4b0v3 u5 411, huh?~” Noli trilled, and she wanted nothing more than to throw him into a different snowbank.
“I’ll feed you your own Void Star, N,” she huffed at him.
“Wh47 4 5c4ry 7hr347 fr0m 50m30n3 wh0 ju57 g07 b3573d by 4 di57r4c7i0n.”
Somewhere above, outside of the massive pile of snow, Sixer laughed like an uprooting tree. Sonnellino was obvious with his attempt to keep in his laughter, only to lose the attempt nearly right away, bursting out into laughter that was clear even through the muffling of the snow. She could even hear Doe make a noise that sounded like a laugh, and she could easily picture Slasher shaking in near-silent laughter as well. Kidd was the last to join in, laughter growing louder as he clearly approached.
His little face soon peeked through the snow, little claws perfect for digging.
“Sooo, do you think that was fun?” he prodded, little eyes full of hope.
1x cracked a smile.
“It was a blast.”