Night's Omen

This is a C.C.C.D.T. = CRASH COURSE CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT THREAD. It is intended to be AU/NOT CANON.

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She did not know how she had gotten into this situation, but the man who was pointing to her, and then to the vehicle, was beginning to upset her greatly. She couldn't understand what he was saying, she couldn't tell him to go away - or she HAD told him to go away, but he wouldn't listen to her - and she couldn't explain that she was looking for someone. How could she tell him she was looking for someone she'd never seen?

  She was not a weak girl, but she was very overwhelmed by all of the noise and the rushing and the shouting and the pulling. She couldn't be a tiger here, because when she was a tiger, people screamed and threw things and ran away. She put her hands over her ears and pressed her lips together, tears spilling from the edges of her eyes. She wanted to go home, but she didn't know where home was.

  She'd know it when she saw it.

  "Come on, miss, I promise, they will take good care of you there," he was saying. He reached up to take her arm, pull it away from her ears, and she opened her mouth and screamed. She screamed and kicked and punched and she might have bitten him if she didn't think that it would be a bad idea. She pushed him down (because he was a bird and she was a cat and cats pushed birds and ate them) and turned to run.

  She didn't turn fast enough, though - or, rather, her head didn't. Her torso was twisted, pushing off the ground in an impressive dash, but when her head snapped around to watch where she was running to, she ran into something instead.

  Or, someone.

She didn't just run right into someone.  She ran right into Ethan Grancourt, who couldn't have even said why the hell he was even approaching this mess.  Normally, he left everyone to deal with their own problems on their own, and this sounded like a problem that wasn't his, but that didn't seem to mean as much as it normally did.  He wasn't usually the impulsive, 'don't-think-before-acting' sort, either.

Apparently, this wasn't the usual sort of situation.

It only took him a few seconds to hone in on what was going on, and it surprised him that not only was his attention predominantly on the young woman with her hands over her ears, screaming, but it made him mad.  Not her, but that this man was trying to touch her.  He was trying to get her into his van, and Ethan could have guessed what was going on with him, but deliberately chose the wrong option.  It fueled his anger more, he'd somewhere along the line decided to do something about this, so when she turned to run away and smacked right into him, he took hold of her shoulders in an attempt to steady her.  She'd hit him like a freakin' battering ram, but he was fortunately durable enough to take the hit without lacking completely in dignity, and he gave her a confused, curious sort of look.  Where did he know her from?  He didn't think he did, but there was something.

What, though?

It would have to wait, since the man with the van was approaching, trying to tell him that he didn't want to be involved, that it was all fine, and Ethan's dark eyes turned from her to the man and back again.  When he finally settled his eyes completely on the approaching 'gentleman', it was with the full purpose of getting rid of him, violently, if necessary.  He gently moved to put the young woman behind him, and then just unloaded.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing?  You want to take this girl into your van and just drive away?  Really?!  How about you just take your perverted fucking ass back into your pedo-fucking-van and forget this ever happened, huh?" he shot at him, at the same time positively ripping at the man's white aura.  He wanted to damage the guy's calm.  He knew that he came on hard, and he meant to.  He wanted that man gone, and he wanted to make sure that girl was alright.  He didn't know why, but it was important.

She didn't know who she was, but she knew who he was, and there was a split second where she knew that he felt it, too. She watched him, blue eyes unnatural and exotic and masked by tears and red lines and hands as she wiped at her face. When he began to yell, she could feel it - similar to a buzzing sound, except all over her skin. It didn't hurt, though - it didn't feel like much of anything, but to the man Ethan was pushing that 'buzzing' at, it seemed like a whole lot of difference.

  She was tall enough that she could barely see what was going on if she stood on her tiptoes, which she did, hands at either of Ethan's shoulders. She peered over, as though with him as a shield they literally couldn't see her.

  "Bad man," she said, mimicking the sounds she'd heard before. "I told you GO AWAY!" she shouted. She had a voice when she wanted to belt it out, and with Ethan standing in front of her, the tigress' confidence had returned somewhat. She wanted to remember that she was a fierce tiger, but she forgot in the concrete and iron city.

  The sound of squealing tires echoed against the alley as the man took off, leaving Ethan standing alone with her. She walked around him slowly, and then put a hand to his heart, and took his, meaning to press it to hers.

  "Hello," she said softly. Blue eyes - they were so out of place, and they fit so well with her; caramel-hued hair that dye jobs envied, and those eyes. "Whole again." she said, very slowly. She had been practicing it so that her words wouldn't sound stupid or misprononced.

There was more than a split second where he was feeling it, and he didn't like that he didn't understand it, but he was working with it for the time being.  He'd just completely metaphysically assaulted a man to chase him away from her, and this girl had taken to him as though they'd known each other all their lives, even though she'd been upset by the other man (who Ethan knew was a shifter, and was almost thinking might have been Single Earth; they'd be thinking he was a vampire or something, now).

He was gone, though.  Whoever he was, Single Earth or pervert, he'd taken off as though Hell was after him, and Ethan suddenly found himself staring down at this girl, who'd not only walked around from her hiding place behind him, but had placed her hand on his chest, right over where his heart would be, and done the same with his own hand on hers.  He had no idea what was going on, but her limited vocabulary was somehow explaining the situation damn well.

He stared down at her, a little surprised at the bright blue eyes that she had, given her other features.  The hair he could have thought was a dye job, though even he'd have admitted he'd never seen an Asian woman with such a good dye job, but the eyes weren't so easily explained.  Actually, nothing about her was easily explained, since he had no clue what was going on, but she was right about that 'whole again' remark.  He hadn't felt this...peaceful, well, ever.

"Hello," he told her, surprisingly just as softly as her, though he had more of a curious look to his face than she did.  "Whole, I think so."

The sensation of floating encompassed her body, like the warmth when she shifted and let her true form out. The tiger on the inside wanted to be on the outside, and there was a blur of light and motion as she moved, shifted. Ethan felt very far away, and it made her sad - she reached out for his hand, but she felt herself falling...


...falling straight out of bed and onto the floor.

Clover awoke with a start, shocked into her human form from the impact. The sound had been one loud muffled thud, and she imagined it probably shook the floor. A full sized female Amur tiger was large, and despite Clover's human size being tall but quite thin, there was no hiding the distinct sound of cat-on-floor sound. The painting that had been delicately hung in the room provided for her smacked the floor with a loud crash, causing her to jump up and scramble back to the wall. She didn't like loud noises, and so her hands went to her ears until she was positive that there was to be no more of them.

  The next sound didn't surprise her at all - her bedroom door flung open to reveal the butler staring at her with a stunned expression on his face. "Child, what happened?" he asked, his tone concerned and exasperated at the same time. They'd all come to know that Clover... she wasn't very "grown up" in the mind. It was more or less how she'd been raised. She was coming along, but she still had her moments.

  Her lips formed a pout as she hugged herself, drawing her knees to her chest. She looked incredibly guilty. "I fell down," she said sadly.

  "Oh, I'll go fetch Mr. Grancourt," he said, and with that, disappeared from her doorway. Not long after, she could hear Ethan's hurried footsteps. The man ran for next to nothing, but Clover had learned that when she fell, she worried him, and when he was worried he moved at a more quick pace.

  "I fell," she said again. "I broke your picture," she added, still feeling quite guilty. She hadn't meant to. It wasn't like she'd pulled it off the wall herself, but the sheer force of her hitting the ground had shaken it off its hanger, and, well - there you had it.

Really, there was almost nothing that wasn't life threatening that made Ethan run, but the combination of the loud thud from upstairs and a sharp pain that fortunately didn't last was enough to nearly cause him to fall out of his chair.  He was on his feet and moving before the only person he trusted in his home (other than Clover) had a chance to even let him know what happened.  They met each other about halfway, and Ethan waved him off to tend to Clover himself.

It still made absolutely no sense to him, and he'd been trying like hell to examine, analyze and explain it, but the fact of the matter was that when anything happened to Clover, it worried him in a way that didn't entirely have anything to do with his own well-being.  Really, he'd never had that problem before, but with Clover, it was different.  He felt more mellow and at peace with her than he ever did at any other time in his life, and it was something that was pretty obvious, even to third parties.  Grayson had nearly choked when he saw it, then laughed hysterically later.  Ethan still had to get back at him for it.

"Really, you fell?  I hadn't heard the entire place shake," he told her, and it was still the sarcasm that he'd have used with anyone else, but lacking in the venom.  It was a weird thing out of him, and when he glanced over at the picture that had fallen off the wall, he really couldn't find it in himself to care.  "Don't worry about the picture, William can take care of it later.  You didn't hurt yourself, did you?"

He knew that she hadn't because she was a shifter, and he'd have definitely noticed if she had because of that stupid thing between them, but he still had to ask.  There was more to it than just if she'd bruised herself, even if he wasn't really well acquainted with this sort of situation.  He even smiled for her.

What?

Clover smiled a small smile for Ethan as he taunted her. She knew he didn't mean it; he didn't hurt her feelings when he said things, not like he did to other people. She put her palms down on the floor and pushed herself up with a small noise, and then straightened the flannel pajama pants that she wore. They were a little too big for her, sitting low on her hips - they were obviously not hers, nor was the white tanktop that she wore. When Ethan was gone late, however, like a cat, she had taken to sleeping on his clothing - or in this case, in them. To some, it might seem awkward, but to Clover, it was familiar.

  "I can paint a new one," she offered brightly. She loved to paint. She didn't like the fancy oils or expensive paper, but they'd found a cheap easel and some canvas with a Crayola watercolour set that she adored, and she decorated his otherwise bleak, dark home with taped pictures of colourful things like waterfalls, mountains, and tigers. Everywhere.

  "Are you going to be home today, or do you have work?" she asked, moving towards him. Clover didn't walk, she glided - the grace that she possessed was astounding, especially in that form of hers. She could have passed for a ballet dancer with how long and slender her arms and legs were - she almost looked unhealthy some days, but there was never a sign of ribs poking out, or Ethan would have stuffed her full of turkey to remedy it. No, Clover simply was the epitome of "wispy".

  She planted a small kiss on his nose, tilting her head a little as she stepped back. She was smiling brightly at the idea of him, and one had to wonder how lucky a man might get that a beautiful woman was elated simply by their presence. It must have been an ego boost, at the very least. "Can we spend the day together if you're not busy?"

That 'whole' thing that she'd said when they first met?  Yeah, that was probably the best way he could ever have explained it, and he didn't like that.  He wanted calculations and an understanding as to how it had happened, and he wanted to know everything about it.  The problem was that with Clover, he wasn't about to put her at risk, because it would risk himself and because he honestly didn't want to do anything that might upset her. 

See how it made no sense whatsoever?

What also made no sense, and William had been chuckling over this recently, was that Ethan's beautiful, elegant home had been 'invaded' by Clover's...innocence?  It was something, anyway.  Ethan liked dark colors and stark contrasts, and he liked marble.  The kitchen was actually quite a bit of black marble run through with white, and Clover had been making it her mission in life to plaster brightly colored paintings she'd done all over the house.  Strangely, he didn't object, though he'd given a few of them unpleasant glances here and there, when she wasn't around to curb his mood.  Mostly, she was around whenever he was home now, and that had a very positive effect on his home-life and general mood around the house.  William certainly preferred it, though he'd gotten used to it years prior.

"I have absolutely no doubt that you'll paint many new ones to take its place," he told her, a bit dryly, but he still wasn't complaining.  He'd still have the old painting taken care of, but it wasn't a big deal.

It didn't hurt that she was gorgeous, and that she was a white tiger, OR that she'd sleep in his clothes.  That was another thing that made little sense, but he found he was having the very male response to that and actually enjoying seeing her in clothes that were his.  She was tall for a woman, only two inches shorter than he was, but she was tiny.  She wore one of his shirts, and it might be close to the right length but she'd still be swimming in it.  He liked seeing it, and now was no different. 

It made him want to change his plans, whatever they were, to make sure he was going to be home that day, and he could deny all he wanted that it mattered to him the way she looked at him, but he'd only really be fooling himself.  Grayson had seen it as soon as he'd met her. 

Speaking of Grayson, Ethan was pretty sure the man was caught up in some side-project since the night before when they'd talked, so he would call Cole's pretty assistant and let her know that her boss didn't need to be dragged away.  "We can spend the day together.  I don't have to be busy."

"Okay!" she cheered. She squeezed beyond him and into the hall, because she wasn't the type that asked people to move rather than rubbing by them like a typical cat and making her own path. A single finger curled and hooked into the back portion of the collar of his shirt, giving him a gentle tug - when in reality if Clover had wanted to, she could have either pulled him down or ripped the shirt, neither of which she would ever do, to pull him out of her room.

  "I think I'd like to go for a swim now," she said. She always spoke so calmly, as though nothing phased her - like she was always in some measure of complacency with whatever was happening around her, and when she was around Ethan, she usually was. "Will that give you time to finish what you were doing?"

  She knew he was doing something when she fell, because Ethan was always doing something when she wasn't there. She interrupted him a lot, and it occurred to her that she made him late often, but again, it didn't seem to concern her terribly. Clover had no real concept of time that she was aware of - she knew night and day, Ethan home and Ethan not home. She was like a glorified pet in so many ways, but she had enough of a mind that she was something else, something more.

  "Maybe we can see Grayson and the pretty lady later?" Clover enjoyed Grayson - he was funny, and he made her laugh a lot. He pulled quarters from her ears, which she could never figure out, but it made her happy because then she could get a soda from the machine in the hall.

He stood still for an instant, not really minding that she rubbed her body against his when she made her move around him, and she was probably the only person in the world who would actually hook her finger in his collar like that and get away with it.  His mother could probably get away with it, though he'd tell her not to, but she'd never do it.  She had him moving, however, which was the whole point, and of his own volition.  She only had to tug, and he followed.  Wonders never cease.

It was absolutely true that she'd interrupted him, and that he was always doing something when she wasn't there, but he wasn't really in a hurry to get back to it.  She was distracting him from work and had been since he'd brought her to his home, but he justified it by understanding that he'd lost his train of thought, so it would be just as easy to pick it up again later as it would be right then.  He didn't have to go back to work, especially since Grayson was probably trying to operate his microwave one-handed with something much more 'important' than his immediate well-being on his mind.  It wouldn't hurt to put it off a little bit longer.

"I'm finished, for now," he told her, rather than explain that she'd distracted him enough that he didn't see the sense in returning immediately, and he felt the same sort of complacency around her that she got from him, so he was comfortable right where he was for the moment. 

Glorified pet, that was an understandable thing to think, but amazingly, Ethan would disagree.  Frankly, he wasn't sure who 'owned' who in this sense, since she'd completely taken over aspects of his life that he'd have never willingly given to someone else, moved into his home, and somehow managed to dictate things about his home and activities without actually telling him what to do.  She just knew what she wanted and liked, and he rarely saw any reason to deny it.  In the same token, he looked out for her and provided for her since she'd arrived, and it was hardly a secret that she appeared to adore him.  It was just too gray around the edges, like where a designated 'pet' would be concerned.  Sure, he'd probably take charge and handle a situation that required handling, but she was a tiger.  There are just some things that a tiger can do and a human can't. 

Grayson had pointed some of that out when they'd talked, though he'd been a lot less concerned with the 'who owns who' because Ethan would have really snapped, then.  He'd just pointed out things like Clover being a tiger, and that they were both obviously happier in each others' presence.  It still made no sense.  "Perhaps we can.  We'll see what Grayson and his pretty lady are doing," he responded, though he didn't really understand her fascination with Cole.  The man was a strange one, and oftentimes frustrating, but she thought he was a comedic riot, especially with that coin trick. 

Ethan hadn't hit a point where he was willing to do parlor tricks to impress her, and he hoped he could hold that off for awhile.