Green was cold.

Beside him, his bag stood an inch taller than he was and half empty, its ancient, cracked leather sporting tarnished brass buckles. Green could have sworn that brass didn't tarnish, but there he had it. Teeth chattering almost angrily, he pulled his robe closer around him, cursing the early autumn wind and looking for signage.

He was probably lying, he thought to himself bitterly, "'Just run into the pillars until you find it,' indeed," he growled to himself, gripping the strap on his luggage hard, feeling every bump through the ancient wheels.

Suddenly, SNAP. Draaaag.

Turning around horrified, Green's eyes widened to see one of the bag's rickety copper legs had snapped from its base, and lay spinning on the floor beside it. "Oh, come on! Are you serious?" He demanded, walking over to look at the bag's base, run fingers over the cracked metal. He hissed, jerking his hand back; the metal was sharp, and surprisingly hot. Kneeling on the cold concrete, he reached for the wheel with a trembling hand, muttering to himself and pulling his robes closer as he tried to jam the halves together again somehow, looking around himself wildly for some kind of reasonable adhesive.

For the first time since this fantastical whirlwind of adventure had began, November found himself alone.

He stood there, in that strange lonely limbo of a place known as a train station, people rushing back and forth around him, none of them sparing him so much as a glance. One small boy, caught between the slipstreams, invisible as the world rushed on without him.

He grabbed his big black trunk, far too large and unwieldy in the small, pale hands of a child, and tugged it to the platform he was supposed to, somehow step between, vanish into the wall as the kindly teacher had explained. Part of him still thought maybe they were all just having another joke at his expense, that those clever actors that had made it seem so real would all point and laugh as he smacked dead into the concrete. But when he looked there, there was another boy there, another oversized trunk.

This one was broken.

A torrent of feelings all rolled through his stomach at once at the sight of him, his hands shaking as his palms grew hot then cold. Could he-.... Did he-... He couldn't..... He did.

His breath caught in his throat as he made one careful step, then another. Soon he was standing over him, looming as the other children always called it, and before he could stop himself, the words slipped out.

"Do you need help?"

The boy startled at November's approach, bright, wild green eyes and a shock of curly brown hair spilling around his face soft and sleek, like cat's fur. At the same time, his hand loosened around the wheel, and it dropped from his grasp with a ping, clattering across the platform to plummet onto the tracks below. The boy raced after it, cursing, but stopped just above the gap, staring down. "Frog pus," he cursed, standing slowly. "Well, that's gone," he sighed, turning around to look at the shadow again, shoulders tight.

Good god, he looked like he was about to cry. Green let out a soft breath of relief as he approached him again, face soft.

Doesn't mean he's safe. He squared his shoulders, brought his chin up. "Kind of you to offer, though," he said, walking forward again, looking the boy up and down for signs that he might be going to the same place. "Everybody streaming past the way they do, it's a rare thing to see someone stop to help another. And you've clearly got no small burden of your own," he observed, looking November's bag up and down. "What did you bring with you? A library?" he asked, soft curiosity in his voice.

"Oh-.... Oh no-....." November gasped, his hands flying to his mouth as his eyes creased with the sting of unspent tears. He knew he shouldn't, knew that his being there at all would just make things worse, and what do you know, it did, the wheel bouncing away, never to be seen again.

The tall, pale boy was backing away now, trying to melt back into the shadows of the train station. But it was too late now. "I'm sorry," he murmured, his voice barely above a whisper, hiding now behind his massive black obelisk of a trunk, his pale hands shaking. "I shouldn't-... I should-.... I should just, go...." He shook his head hard, but something in him didn't want to move. After all, what was back there but the vast lost emptiness of busy station? He didn't even know if he could ever get through, and then he'd miss his train, and probably just have to go home, or, what passed for home for him.

So he didn't go, not just yet. He just hid behind his trunk like that would protect him, somehow. "It's... Just a bag," he mumbled in shy response to the other boy's questions, "it's got all my things in it... Everything I own...."

Green's eyes creased in irritation as the tall boy apologized, shrinking behind his bag as if Green had raised his fist to him, or called him names. This boy was nearly twice his size! Where was his spine? Where was his fire? Pacing around the bag, Green put his hands on his hips. "Now, don't be like that," he huffed. "It's nobody's blasted fault, and I won't have that nonsense entertained," he shook his head, gesturing elegantly and dismissively. "And you were perfectly polite and could still be helpful, besides. Your bag's wheels look sturdy enough," he said, poking at the wheel with the toe of a worn leather shoe. "And you look like you might be able to carry mine," he said, looking at the boy's shoulders, his arms. A veritable redwood of quivering apologies.

Good lord, did he look terrified.

Green sighed, the anger suddenly draining out of him. "Look, it's really not that bad. And if you beat yourself up before anyone else can do it for you, your enemies are just going to have more energy to do it later. Blame fate, blame me for jumping, blame the wind for making my fingers shake, but don't blame yourself."

November shrunk back as Green stepped forward, his long, gangly body curling around itself, as if trying to make itself small enough to pop into nothingness. He shook his head at the words he spoke, as if bewildered by the concepts held within them, confused and disbelieving. "No, I-..." But the other boy just kept right on talking, as if he hadn't said a word, as if all of this were perfectly normal and natural.

"I-... I suppose I could carry your bag for you," he mumbled, voice small and soft and scared, "I mean, it would only be fair..." He sighed, clung to his trunk with enough force to white his knuckles. Maybe he could fix this, it wasn't over yet. He'd carry the other boy's bag for him, and in exchange, he wouldn't hate him.

Then the boy spoke again, and the confusion was back in force. "But-... I startled you," he murmured, his dark eyes pleading as they locked with the other's, "If I hadn't, you'd have never dropped it..." He sighed, his expression and mannerisms entirely lost. In fact, he couldn't understand why the boy wasn't more mad at him. What could he be trying to do?

Green watched the boy apologize with growing ire in the pit of his belly, boiling and bubbling and making him feel as if he might be sick. The cringing, whinging thing before him made him feel like a monster, made him feel like stepping forward and biting him in the arm. At least then he'd have cause to wince. At least then he'd see him, instead of seeing nothing but his own perceived ineptitude. His lip curled.

"Certainly I might have,"the boy spit back vehemently, brow furrowed. "Someone could have bumped into me, or a train whistle might have gone off, or I could simply have slipped, and then it wouldn't matter whether you startled me or not, would it? And even if you hadn't, how was I going to fix this?" he asked, gesturing at the wheel. "A bit of spit and a wad of gum, perhaps? I don't even have any," he grunted. "My best bet was to get someone who knows a repairing charm to do me the favor once at school..." He leaned against the boy's bag, intending to push it along. It didn't budge; November had a death grip on it.

He paused, glared at the boy. "Or you could help me get it back."

November's head tilted as he stared at the other boy in utter bafflement, tried to piece together why he seemed to be getting angrier and angrier and angrier at him, yet vehemently insisting that he hadn't done anything wrong. It made no sense at all, had to be some kind of joke or strange prank, one that the children at the orphanage had simply never thought to try on him before. He was frozen in his bafflement, not daring to move so much as a hair, or even breathe, for fear of the wrong choice setting this unpredictable encounter off further.

And then he spoke again, and November knew the score.

He gulped, looked out across the tracks. Trains roared by, the speed of their passing enough to gust a cold wind across his skin, ruffle his hair. "You-...." He looked back to the other, his gaze pleading for elucidation that this was anything but what he thought it was. "You want me to go down there?" His voice was near silent, terrified, but then he looked away, resigned. "A-alright," he said, his little feet already taking careful, halting steps towards the tracks, that brilliant yellow line beyond which was the drop.

Green stared up at the boy in baffled fury as he stared down at him in equal confusion. Why was this moppish thing looking at him like that? Frozen and terrified, as if a blow might come at any second? He hasn't threatened him. He hadn't even insinuated anything. Was it him, or did the boy simply respond to everything that way? The thought only made him madder, made his chest boil.

And then he stepped towards the edge of the platform, and his heart nearly stopped.

"Wait! No! Are you crazy?" Green snapped, rushing out in front of him, arms up, eyes wide. "You'll get yourself killed that way! Even if you don't get flattened, the rail's electric, and god only knows which one," he huffed, looking down at them over his shoulder as if they might leap up and bite.

"No. I said help me get it back, not get it back for me. That implies a cooperation, not a dictation," he raised his chin, hands on his hips. "You're tall and probably heavy, but I'm small and light and fairly quick. I'll get the protective gloves from my bag, slip them on, and then you can lower me down there. As long as you're quick enough in pulling me back up, I don't see what the worry is; frankly, even if a train came, I could probably fit in the gap between it and the platform..."

November drew back, startled, as the other boy leapt in front of him. Just as things were beginning to make sense again, they were dashed into the swirling chaos of confusion once more. He thought he'd finally grasped the point of all this, and here was this tiny, spitfire boy yelling at him again, like he had done it wrong. Maybe that was the game, that whatever thing he chose would be the wrong one.

"I thought that was-.... Never mind," he mumbled, his narrow shoulders drooping like a dried and withered stem. He listened that way, quiet and bowed, as the other boy explained his plan to get his missing wheel back, but this gave November pause, made him shake his head. "But-... If you go down there, won't you get hurt or killed too? No, you-... You really shouldn't-..." He thought of the tiny boy dropping down into the tracks, of that bright snapping fire crushed beneath unforgiving steel wheels. "N-no," he insisted, more vehemently now, "I'll never be able to get you up in time, you can't, you just can't...." The fear was gone in his voice, replaced with something else. A, conflict, of some sort, unknowable to any on the outside.