Divinitas

007 - The House of Fire


\"No way in Hell am I going to wear that thing day in day out!\"

The yelling pierced the early morning serenity. The unsettling dream from the previous night had long been forgotten in the wake of the horrible prospect of having to parade around in that skimpy top they called an uniform.

\"The rules say you must, Phoenix,\" Draco said in response, waving the little booklet in front of Phoenix\'s glaring face. \"And frankly, after last night, I see little reason for you to be so shy about revealing a little skin.\"

\"It\'s the principle!\" Phoenix shouted back, clutching the plain white shirt he had pulled on as if it was a lifeline. \"In public and in private are two different things! I do not want to be seen as some preening little prat!\"

Gryps didn\'t spare the arguing two a glance. His cool composure back in place as if it had never cracked the night before, the icy eyed boy walked out the door dressed strikingly in his silver and black House of Air uniform.

Chima looked after him with longing, the promise of food pulling him insistently on an invisible string. \"Phoenix, please!\" Chima finally begged. \"I\'m hungry! Can\'t you just give in?\"

\"No! Never!\" Phoenix exclaimed, scandalised at the mere suggestion.

Chima simply stared at him with large seemingly innocent green eyes. And then pounced onto the older boy, a giant of a black and green cat gripping onto the white shirt with his sharp little claws. \"Yes!\" he insisted, yanking the poor shirt and subsequently sending all the clear buttons sailing through the air.

~
~

\"Look on the bright side. Firstly, you no longer have to wear the bandages, else you would have looked very silly with white underneath the black. Secondly, at least the top covers your nipples, so it is not as if you\'re going around without wearing a shirt at all,\" Draco reasoned.

The boy just glared. All through breakfast, and all through the obligatory welcoming ceremony where the Principal with his practised smile gave his bordering on threatening speech. The first years at the tender age of thirteen looked very intimidated, trembling like leaves almost, and staring wide eyed up at the Principal as if he were the Devil himself.

And he did look that way. Darkly evil, with his seductive smile and deep brown eyes accented by honey coloured hair and tanned complexion. The tall dark stranger in the dangerous night.

With the conclusion of his welcoming speech, his dark eyes swept the immense hall, searching like a spot light. They came to rest, lingering on the scowling figure of Phoenix dressed in his Metamorphosis uniform that looked just a little crumpled, as if forced upon his agile body. The smile deepened as the boy suddenly jumped, locking those burning red orbs onto the Principal\'s darkly amused gaze.

The Principal laughed silently to himself, lifting his gaze and searching out those of Aether\'s, leaning casually against the back wall. The violet eyed boy titled his golden head just a little, a smile playing on his kissable lips. He lifted his hand and drew a circle in mid air with his finger.

The man shook his head in disbelief, finding it as task to keep from chuckling. \"Really, Aether… The collar so soon?\"

~ * ~

Phoenix\'s defiant glare was lost on the Principal who seemed to be thoroughly amused by something beyond his line of sight. The bastard had singled him out of the hundreds within the hall, startling him with his direct and penetrating stare, and now couldn\'t even be bothered to return it? Phoenix felt just a little be cheated out of his rights.

The hall was emptying out now as the students made their way to the first class. Well, now was the time to see what this school that allowed weapons and slavery had to offer in terms of a decent education.

~ * ~

If Phoenix had for even a moment contemplated that the workload would be light since it would seem the school was not much of a civilized nor strict establishment, the boy was gravely mistaken. A quick glance at the colour coded timetable Draco had produced for both himself, Phoenix and Chima showed clearly the large number of different classes they were to attend.

In academic studies, there were the standard Mathematics, English, Sciences, and more unusual subjects such as Mythology of all useless things. The list continued for some length. And as Phoenix quickly found out to his and Chima\'s great dismay was that the amount of homework they received in each subject was just as long as the list of subjects itself.

If that was not enough, there were the extra curricular activities that were compulsory for them to undertake, including the Metamorphosis training sessions. For the House of Fire, they were scheduled for Monday evenings. On top of that, there were classes Tuesday and Thursday mornings called Equestrian Skills. What that involved was a little beyond Phoenix, having never come across the word before in his life.

\"I realise now I\'ve been living in a dream…\" Phoenix said in an exhausted and lifeless voice, his flaming head resting like a dead thing on the dining hall table next to his untouched dinner. \"I believed that the life I had at the orphanage was bad. Where uncompassionate bastards picked on a little parentless boy… But after today, I realise that all adults are cruel creatures who feed off the suffering of those younger than them, spiteful that we still have our youth whilst they are old and have made nothing of themselves…\"

\"You\'re giving human beings too much credit, Incendium,\" Gryps said flatly as he ate his meal in small bites. The silver haired boy had taken up calling his three room mates by their last names for some odd reason. A formality, perhaps, to distance himself, to keep friendships from forming.

Ignoring Gryps, Phoenix continued his monologue. \"So they dump as much homework as possible upon our poor youthful bodies, hoping to weigh our high spirits down with the leaden weights of stress and depression… Damn them for succeeding!\" the boy exploded, slamming his fist down on the table and making glasses and dishes jump. He then promptly starting tearing at his hair.

\"Sa… Draco… Is that a symptom of becoming old and senile?\" Chima asked, elbows propped up on the table, his boyish head held in his hands.

The older boy chuckled. \"Well… It helps the process along,\" he said quietly so Phoenix wouldn\'t hear. Chima laughed with innocent delight.

Passer-bys gave the group of four curious looks. Not only did this table seat one of the most talked about students in the school, but also because there was a member from each of the four Houses. And they weren\'t tearing out each other\'s throats, but rather laughing together...

The other Houses seated in their group of tables didn\'t seem to take too kindly to the mixing of the elements. There was, after all, intense rivalry between the Houses. Yet no one dared approached the table. Yesterday\'s events were still too fresh in their minds.

\"There you are, my Little Phoenix!\"

Instantly Phoenix froze in his attempt to pull his flaming hair out from their roots. His head slowly turned in the direction of the voice, knowing already whom he would see standing no more than a few feet from him, and absolutely dreading it.

\"You should be down at the Metamorphosis training hall by now! Come on, come on!\" Casi hurried, the long silver twirling baton in her right hand a very threatening accessory.

In the blink of an eye, Phoenix had abandoned his uneaten dinner and was rug awg away from the pretty violet beauty and his friends who stared after him in mild disbelief.

\"Why are you running away from me?!\" Casi cried out after the retreating back, and began the chase after the elusive bird of fire, the two streaking through the hallways as they dashed towards the lower levels where the Metamorphosis training hall was located.

\"Phoenix really has a problem with relationships, doesn\'t he?\" Chima commented, blinking his large jade coloured eyes.

Draco nodded in agreement.

Gryps simply stared after Casimir with emotionless silver eyes until she had disappeared from sight. Then, as if absolutely nothing out of the ordinary had occurred, quietly returned to eating his dinner.

~ * ~

The fiery boy took the steps down into the Metamorphosis hall two steps at a time. It wasn\'t as if he was looking forward to being involved in something he had not chosen himself to participate in, and thought rather lowly of, but from his currently view point, anything would have been better than dealing with that happy-go-lucky always optimistic girl. Something to do with irrational fear, he was sure of it.

The training hall was a mere husk of its former self, Phoenix realised as he hit the bottom of his long decent. It seems another place, so vast and empty, once a heart beating with life, now dead, the blood drained. Its immense size was almost suffocating in the absence of the majority of the school body. Each step he took echoed sharply against curved walls, wrapping him up in choking sound. The LCDs too were dark and still, unlike the way they were yesterday, flashing with brilliant computer graphics.

\"So the scholarship student finally decided to join us,\" some voice muttered loudly, no doubt intended for Phoenix to hear.

\"Heard he tried to mess with the Child of Air and the Child of Water and the Child of Soul yesterday. Probably thinks he\'s so good for doing it, the fool,\" another loud whisper hissed.

\"Be quiet!\" A loud commanding voice boomed out in the cavernous hall. \"We\'re here to train for Metamorphosis, not to bad mouth another House member! Our goal is to be victorious in the annual tournament in Metamorphosis, and that is all that matters, understood? Now, all of you, get into the simulators and boot up!\"

There was a fury of movement as the members scrambled to comply with orders issued by who was no doubt the Child of Fire. As they moved, the Child of Fire was revealed, a tall handsome boy of seventeen with dark reddish brown hair and chocolate eyes.

\"You five, don\'t just stand around and giggle!\" he exploded at the five cheerleaders standing off to the side. He seemed awfully exasperated when Casimir simply winked at them before organising her small group of cheerleaders for the House of Fire. \"I do not see the point of having cheerleaders. It\'s not as if any of the members can hear them cheer whilst in Metamorphosis,\" he muttered. \"Useless fan service…\"

With a shake of his auburn curls, the Child of Fire turned his attention to the glaring boy standing a short distance away from him. \"Phoenix, right?\" He stuck his right hand out and shook the younger boy\'s hand roughly. \"I\'m Ares. Child of Fire. In other words, the leader for the House of Fire. Bit strange for a student to be automatically assigned to a House, not to mention you are a scholarship student…\" Ares leaned closer to Phoenix as if confiding a deep dark secret. \"I would be careful if I were you… There are rumours that last year\'s scholarship students didn\'t just leave, but that they disappeared at the end of the last school year…\" The Child of Fire straighten himself and looked Phoenix up and down. \"Alright, that said, here\'s the run down on Metamorphosis:

\"Best game there ever was, Phoenix, you\'ll love it. There\'s no controls you\'ll need to learn, really, and that\'s the beauty of it. The simulators, those streamline capsules over there, actually link to your conscious thoughts, and react to your impulses in real time. Personally, I think the best way to learn is to just jump in. But before that, I think it\'ll be best if I run you through the basic rules first.

\"Okay, where to start… Alright, the Houses battle each other in one-on-one duels, and all challenges are, and must be, honoured on Saturdays. Hear there are some not so pleasant consequences for you if the Child of Soul challenges you, but I\'m sure you\'ll deal with it. A match is said to be finished when only one opponent is able to continue. Oh, and by the way, the rules do allow you to surrender, but it is considered to be cowardly, you know? So don\'t do it. But that\'s for challenges only. In training, we go up against the computer. But don\'t think lowly of it! It can beat the pants off you fastest than any human counterpart!\" he said rapidly, barely pausing for a breath. \"Okay! I think that\'s about it. Any questions? No? Good. Here, get in. It\'s easy. Just don\'t panic when the ribbons of flame appear, okay?\"

The stream of words pouring from Ares\' mouth had left Phoenix gapping, unable to get half a word in edge wise. And before he could give a panicked exclamation of \'what?!\' he found himself being shoved into one of the simulators, and the sliding door sealing shut to entomb him in complete darkness.

The reaction was immediate. Floating in front of his face, a glowing screen of inoffensive blue appeared, and small neat letters surfaced.

Please identify yourself.

Phoenix blinked at the screen. And then turned around furiously in the reclined padded seat in search of a keyboard or some sort of input device. Nothing. \"How am I meant to identify myself if I don\'t have a bloody keyboard?\" the boy demanded, scowling.

Another glowing line appeared on the opaque flat screen. \"Say my name? You\'re that intelligent to realise that these words aren\'t my name?\" Phoenix asked, amazed. The letters spelling \'yes\' appeared. \"Okay… It\'s Phoenix Incendium.\"

Welcome to Metamorphosis, Phoenix Incendium of the House of Fire. The initiation process for synchronising your active thoughts to Metamorphosis will now commence.

With the last word printed, the entire chamber glowed a warm red, and suddenly it seemed the chair Phoenix was sitting in disappeared from underneath him. It felt like a dream, all this, because the bewildered boy found floating in empty space, the red glow the only thing surrounding his body.

Then, appearing from nowhere, and without warning, snakes of fire from all directions darted towards Phoenix, intent on shooting his body through and through.

\"Oh shit!\" the boy yelped, trying everything to move out of their trajectory, thrashing his limbs around clownishly. It was to no effect. He simply hung in the same point of space, a puppet threaded on invisible strings.

Closer and closer the arrows of flame race towards him, aimed at his chest. At the last moment, they diverted their course and circled around the, tr, trapping Phoenix within a skeletal sphere. The ribbons of flame spun finer, so that they were no more than glowing strands of flaming silk, twisting around Phoenix\'s limbs and body, around every finger and strand of hair. So bright and so close, the flames that licked without burning Phoenix\'s pale skin, the boy could not help but close his brilliant red eyes.

Moments passed. He was still alive… Wasn\'t he? Cautiously the boy opened one ruby eye, peaking out under long dark lashes to see what had become of himself. Quickly the other eye snapped open as he simply stared.

All around him was a rolling landscape of greenery, broken only by large protruding boulders and fallen trunks of petrified trees.

\"Where the hell am I…?\" Phoenix whispered, eyes large and sweeping the world surrounding him. Nothing but the same repeating scenery in all directions until it reached the vivid blue horizon. The boy lifted his hands and stared. They were his hands. With the same slightly chewed nails and their embedded dirt underneath. The uniform he wore was the same crinkled black top trimmed with blood red Chima shoved onto him earlier that morning.

Suddenly a screen blinked into existence next to Phoenix at eye level, and the boy found himself staring at the grinning face of Ares.

\"Great to see you\'ve passed the sync stage. Magnificent special effects, no?\" he asked. \"Now listen, today, I just want you to familiarise yourself with the system. Ask Metamorphosis to send you some grade one nemesis, got it? I\'ll talk to you after the session. Ends in fifty-two minutes. Have fun!\"

Phoenix\'s mouth was once again ajar with words left unsaid. The screen had vanished before he could even give an acknowledgment. Damn that Child of Fire…

Another screen popped up beside where the previous screen baring Ares\' head had been. A line of text immediately appeared on it.

Grade one nemesis are the lowest level enemies, and thus easiest to defeat. Would you like to be placed against a grade one nemesis?

The boy opened his mouth once again, intent on saying, \'sure, whatever, just get this over and done with.\' But once again, he was interrupted, this time by another line of text appearing on the screen.

Metamorphosis decides to inform you, however, that a grade one nemesis will not give you sufficient skills to best the Child of Soul in a Duel.

Metamorphosis also decides to inform you that the Child of Soul will challenge you to a Duel scheduled for this forth coming Saturday. The possibility of your being victorious against the Child of Soul at your current level is 0.27%. This is taking into consideration your face-off with the Child of Soul yesterday evening, and the fact that he was able to dodge your attack whilst you received a significant wound upon your back.

Phoenix simply balked at the last message, glowing unthreateningly on the transparblueblue tinged screen. \"How the fuck did you know…?\" the boy breathed, a stunned expression masking his face.

But all the screen wrote in reply was a phrase completely alien to the dazed boy:

Si tu amitto tuus somnium tum omnia is conficio.

Not one moment was given to Phoenix before the grade one nemesis appeared, obliterating the strange words from his mind.

It wasn\'t a humanoid opponent. No, it couldn\'t have been farther from. A giant white armoured snake reared up from the crumbling ground, its long streamline body towering above the small human below.

\"Shit,\" was all Phoenix could say before the serpent lunged forward to attack.

~ * ~

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