Rain Dance

Name: Voltaire Zephyr
Age: 17
Gender: Male
Occupation: Hunter/Outlaw
Race: Human
Hair color/style: Platinum blonde, pulled back in a messy ponytail
Eye color: Aqua-green
Skills: Gunmanship, mechanics, traps, fire powers
Personality: Adamant, protective, impish, tends to push himself too hard
Other: Once just a regular Hunter in a high-ranked guild, he is now on the run with Adair Gale and Ava. Their pursuers are the Gales, one of the highest ranked Hero bloodlines and Adair’s own family.
----

Rain! He hated rain!

Voltaire leered at the torrent outside the cave, he himself soaked and shivering slightly. He wouldn't be wet and cold for long, as steam wafted off his body furiously, but right now he was still wet and cold. Goddamn sudden showers. He blew out indignant fire from his mouth, as if that would scare the summer storm away.

More importantly, this delayed his reunion with Ava and Adair. They were also in this maze of caves and tunnels, but at the far end. Normally He would have just cut through the forest and entered the cave entrance they were staying at, but then all this damn rain came and he had to run for shelter. Prolonged exposure to rain could be deadly for someone with fire affinities like him.

He wondered if he should wait out the storm or go the long way around.

Name: Kimi
Age: 16 by human standards
Gender: Female
Occupation: Princess
Race: Demon but has a human appearance
Hair color: Ivory white
Eye color: neon blue
Skills: limited Black magics, limited flight
Personality: Shy, almost child-like. She is very attentive and likes to learn about everything.
Other: She has a half brother that she ran away with but they were separated. Their father wants her dead, but wants the prince back alive, so she has to continue running from anything he sends after her, being too weak and inexperienced to fight them off.
___________________________________________________________

Kimi shivered farther back in the tangled mess of caves. She could hear the rain pounding outside and she knew it was only going to get worse. She moved around in her small hiding place and gathered eveything she would need for a fire.

She lit the fire in the middle of her little cave, off to the side of the tunnel and watched as the smoke drifted out and down the tunnel to the cave entrance. She had no idea that it went out past Voltaire, or that he was even there. All she wanted to do was get warm, being as she was from a hot climated world.

Voltaire didn't think much of the smoke at first. No doubt he was blowing out plenty of it in his frustration. But then he realized that in fact he was not spitting out much smoke himself, and that the dark vapor seemed to be wafting from the back of the cave.

He got up and dove farther inside the cave. Were Adair and Ava close by after all? But what he found was not his usual companions but a young girl with hair even paler than his own. She looked miserable next to the fire. What was someone like this doing by herself?

"Uh, hey!" he called out. "You live here?"

Kimi looked up with a start. When her eyes fell on Voltaire she paniced.

Kimi lept to her feet and rushed out the back way of her little cave. She widely hoped he wouldn't pursue her, since this was a dead end. She ducked out of sight behind a stalagmite and pulled her hood up to cover her bright hair. She crouched there, shivering and praying with her eyes shut, because they had a habit of glowing in the dark.

Voltaire stood there dumbfounded for a moment. He wondered if he should go after her. She didn't seem to think much of him, and she hadn't even seen him breathe fire yet.

He glanced at the fireplace and the scant remains of food nearby. Off in the corner was a lone tattered blanket. So she really was by herself. Once again he had to wonder why.

Or maybe not. He knew the type of fear that had flared in her eyes. It was the fear of the prey, fear of the hunted. He felt an unexpected stab of anger.

He turned to look outside. It was still pouring. He sighed and shrugged. He wouldn't be going out in that weather. He might as well go after the girl and make sure she didn't get eaten by the human-sized bugs he'd seen slithering around.

Kimi stayed crouched behind the stalagmite. She finally sat with her back to the rock structure and drew her knees to her chest, trying to keep warm. She was small for her age and race, a measly 5 foot compared to the six and seven foot females on her home world. Her small frame shivered violently as the freezing rock sapped what little body heat she had, her internal temperature was only 60 degrees at most when she was normal.

Kimi's stomach growled softly and she realised that she hadn't eaten since yesterday. And she had only eaten a little since her food stores were low. She was putting off going and finding more after her last encounter with another demon in the forest.

Voltaire trudged through the cave, carefully stepping around any puddles he saw. Being vulnerable to water was just so damn inconveniant because it was everywhere. He winced as a droplet from the ceiling hit his hand and stung like cold acid.

He was so wrapped up cursing over the cave dew that he tripped over a upjutting edge and fell flat on his face...right next to the girl. However, he was too busy fuming over his stupidity and sore face to notice this.

Kimi jumped when Voltaire landed next to her. Silently, carefully, she edged away from him, trying to go unnoticed.

Kimi was so focused on Voltaire that she didn't notice her tail had come back and she stapped on it as she was trying to crab walk backwards around the stalagmite. She let out a soft cry of pain and fell onto her back.

"Eh?" Voltaire muttered as he rubbed his face, now noticing the girl laying nearby. "Ah crap, I didn't step on you or something did I?"

Just then he noticed a herd of dog-sized, purple-shelled bugs clattering toward them. In annoyance Voltaire spit fire at them, and they scurried away. He turned back to her.

"Anyway, you okay?"

Kimi was still shaking, from the cold more than anything else. She nodded jerkily, holding her probably bruised tail to her chest. She realised that Voltaire had no immediate desire to hurt her, judging by the fact he had asked if she was alright. She moved into a sitting position and looked up at the hunter.

Voltaire noticed the tail, which meant she wasn't human. Well, she wasn't a particularly vicious demon. Hell, he trusted demons more than humans nowadays. The few humans he did trust were changelings like him, with demonic pulses moving his blood instead of heartbeats.

"Anyway, I'm Voltaire. Who are you?"

"Kimi" She replied softly. She gracefully stood, still holding her tail and still shaking.

Her hood fell back when she stood, allowing her ivory hair to fall down her back to its full length, ending at the back of her knees. It wasn't hard to see that she had a delicate build; the men's clothes she had on fit her badly and were torn but did nothing to hide her slender frame.

Kimi tilted her head as she regarded Voltaire "...What are you?" she asked softly.

"Human. Mostly," replied Voltaire, think of how to explain things without going into details. "My heart's elsewhere, in Ava. She gives me my powers. Which reminds me, have you happened to see a big gold-and-red bird and a red-haired human around?"

Kimi shook her head. "I stay in there" She replied, pointing to the room she had come from. "I haven't seen anyone since I last went out into the forest."

"I see. Well, it was worth a shot," said Voltaire, mostly to himself. "They're probably on the other side of this tunnel system. If it wasn't raining so damn hard I would just cut through the forest."

The old question still nagged at him, even thugh it was no business of his own.

"How come you're by yourself, anyway? This ain't an ideal place to go solo."

Kimi lowered her eyes and looked away. "I wasn't alone" She murmured softly. "My big brother was with me... But they took him back."

"They? Who are they?" asked Voltaire. He doubted it was the Gales, since they rarely took live prisoners, but there were plenty of other Hero bloodlines to worry about as well. "And why didn't they take you? You escape?"

"They don't want me... I'm not important. I'm... Disposable." Kimi mumbled. "Big brother made me hide when they found us... He led them away but they got him anyway. Now I'm the only loose end" She hugged herself, still shivering.

"Big brother was always protecting me..."

Voltaire felt anger hotter than any fire burning in his chest. He glared at the darkness and sneered, as if the enemy lurked in the black.

"Story of our lives, huh?" he said, spitting on the cave floor. It hissed loudly as it ate into the rock. "Yeah, as far as our own pursuers are concerned, I'm nothing. They just want Adair so they can kill 'im. But I ain't gonna let 'em. Damn heartless bastards can go burn in hell."

He spewed fire at the ground as if to make his point, but it was really just frustration.

"You should get back to your friends..." Kimi mumbled. "They must be worried."

She pulled her hood back up and started to walk back to her cave.

"Hey hold on, why don't you come with me for now? There are a lot of demons in here and Hunters that might be stalking them. Besides, if Mr. Hero heard that I left some hunted girl out here by herself then he'd give me hell," Voltaire offered, Mr. Hero being his nickname for Adair.

He heard a loud scuttling sound. More bugs?

Kimi's pale face paled farther. She slowly backed away from the entrance. "There is something out there" She whispered in fear. "And I don't think its human"

"Probably not, especially since I haven't seen any other humans in days," Voltaire replied casually, not counting himself and Adair in the human equation. Regardless he felt his body tense up and his hand hover over the gun in his holster. Usually he breathed a little fire downward as a threat pose, but he didn't want to give away his position in the darkness.

"Can you fight?" he asked her.

"Not well" Kimi replied. "I-I only know a little magic, none of it combat and I never learned any hand to hand" She quivered. "Royal Females are forbidden to learn combat"

"Well that's a dumbass rule," Voltaire remarked, before registering the 'royal' part of the response. Two hunted royals. She and Adair would be a perfect match.

But at the moment he other things to focus on than speculating relationships. A creature emerged from the black, the front part crab and the bottom half centipede. It raised itself up as far as the cave ceiling would let it, which wasn't very far. It snapped its crusty claws furiously, much like a regular rattler would shake its tail.

"Well if you can't fight then you'd better run," the young man with aqua-green eyes warned, spitting fire. "I'll deal with this guy."