Words Do Not Settle Debts (Invite Only)

Rebecca stopped. Stock still. She turned her head and looked straight forward at the house she was just passing. It was a place, you could say, that gave you the creeps when you looked at it, even Rebecca got a little creeped out by it. That was probably because she had never seen it before.

Moving up the path, patched of brown bark crunching under her feet as she walked Rebecca fingered the shrunken heads on the gate with an expression of disinterest, she had seen things like this before.

With a soft sigh she moved up to the house and grinned at what she saw, it was a wreck that much was clear, it was abandoned and disused, that much was obvious, but she also knew that it would be a great place to come when she needed to be on her own, just like now.

It was dark and her shift at the local book store had just finished, sneaking into the house Rebecca sat in the blissful dark and closed her eyes.

Alex Richardson.

No, that reminded him too much of Dick. And he just knew that Dick would find it awfully amusing considering they'd always teased each other about their names. His obvious lack of a name being what Dick took the piss out of him for and he... well he called him Dick.

Alex Wrathson.

No. Where the hell did he even come up with a surname that stupid? Made no sense. He wasn't even that wrathful. More... chaotic neutral. That was a good way of describing him.

Alex Smith.

Nyos no! He had to share head space with the guy and he liked him and all but he wasn't taking his name. People would talk about him being his son or something. And he was older than Cobalt!

Alex Chambers.

When had he settled on Alex as a first name?

Alex Masters.

He liked the idea of the master bit but it might get a bit old to him. But he liked the idea of the surname beginning with M.

Alex Mason.

Oh he liked that name. He liked it a lot. It had the Alex part, which he liked for reasons he could no longer remember, and the surname began with M. Not only that but masons were strong characters if his memory served. It was good enough.

Forming himself a human-like body from being a blob of living metal the size of a pebble was no mean feat but it wasn't too hard for him. As soon as he finished forming he realised he wasn't alone in the room. Cursing his spatial awareness, the newly named Alex Mason turned to the girl and held up a hand,

"He-" he paused and ran his new tongue over his teeth, "New teeth... different from Cobalt's... weird..."

His eyes widened and then he grinned a little,

"Awesome!" he cheered happily, "I get Cobalt's accent! Best thing about the bogtrotter... wait. I think I just insulted myself."

Realising that he'd gone off on a tangent and ignored the girl, he waved again,

"Sorry about that. Hey." he greeted her happily before realising he was cold. He looked down and his eyes widened. He covered himself with his hands, "Umm... sorry... I'm not good with clothes."

Concentrating, clothes formed on his body. Black jeans and a MCR t-shirt. He smiled,

"Better."

Rebecca tilted her head up as she heard a creak on the floorboards that shouldn't have been there and her eyes widened in shock but she didn't do anything, she just sat there calmly looking at the boy who had appeared out of nowhere. Maybe an act of accidental magic? Early apparition?

She was sure there were lots of reasons to explain why he was here.

Unable to stop smirking as she looked at him she blushed as she realised something, something very key that he was missing from his body. That being clothes. Calmly she closed her eyes and listened to him with an amused smile on her face, what was this not taking about?

Aware that she was being addressed and he had now found some clothes Rebecca opened her eyes again and stared at the boy, her cool blue eyes surveying him, her black hair moving to cover one side of her face.

"Hello."

Seeing that his brief nudity and his odd habit of talking to himself had made her smile, Alex thought she was a bit strange. Which was good. He was a living, magical, lump of liquid metal impersonating a schoolboy. If he told that to someone who wasn't weird then they'd probably call him crazy. A stray thought popped into his head.

She was attractive.

This was a new thought to him. He looked her over casually, not being obvious about it, and analysed her. He almost rolled his eyes when he figured it out. She was, essentially, a younger version of Cobalt's 'type'. Therefore, it seemed, he'd adopted the man's taste in women as well as his accent. He smiled in the same way he'd observed Cobalt do when he wanted people to like him. It was a friendly grin that made him look approachable,

"Sorry about that." he appologised, "I didn't mean to interrupt your peace a quiet Miss..."

There was a long period of silence through the room and she smiled softly and she quickly covered it up, looking up through her curtain of hair at the boy. Without him noticing she flickered her eyes across him, taking in exactly how he looked and held himself which seemed to her to be tempestuous.

As he asked her for her name Rebecca moved the black hair from her eyes with a slender hand and let her eyes show through properly. Piercing and cool they stared into his own and she sighed softly.

"Holloway."

It was a fault of hers that she wouldn't speak until she had deemed the person worthy of the effort, after all, people could be so troublesome.

"And you are the boy who appeared out of nowhere and flashed me." she smirked fleetingly then her expression turned neutral again

The period of silence was not, to Alex, uncomfortable. He'd lived as a freaking pebble for a few centuries after all, you got used to silence. Or you talked to yourself inside your head and went mad. But he didn't go mad. It wasn't as if he had a mind to lose after all. He'd always been pretty much a bit... unhinged. It made life interesting after all.

He stared into her piercing eyes for a few seconds. He wasn't lost in them, that was too cliche, he was just enjoying the view. They were incredibly lovely eyes, a shade of blue he quite liked. His own eyes shifted to the same colour,

"Holloway?" he paused and thought for a moment, thinking about any Holloways that Cobalt knew. He tilted his head to the side with a small smile, "Rebecca... right?"

Alex chuckled a little at her comment and shrugged a little. It was kind of true, even if it had been entirely unintentional. He held out a hand for her to shake,

"Hi. My name's Alex Mason an- oh my god!" he went off on a tangent as he noticed the shoes she was wearing, "You're shoes are awesome! What brand are they?"

Rebecca could feel him staring back at her and it wasn't uncomfortable for her, it was quite nice to have someone return the same interactions that she did, after all it wasn't very often you met someone who would stare into your eyes for ages. Not that was a good or bad thing. Just an observation.

"How did you know that?"

Her eyes furrowed and Rebecca stood up suddenly, not liking the way this boy shed never seen before knew something about her when she knew nothing of him.

Nodding her head in greeting Rebecca remained silent and only picked up her bag from the floor next to her and threw it over her shoulder, flipping her hair behind her shoulders and over to one side.

"Converse All Stars. Muggle brand."

Alex shrugged his shoulders at her question and leant back against the wall. He didn't really have to answer the girl. However, as he continued to look into her eyes he found more and more that the urge to tell her was strong. Smiling a little he chuckled,

"You'd think I was crazy if I told you." he promised her with a smile, "Because it's pretty unbelievable to be fair. I only believe it because I've seen worse."

Deciding to get a close look, Alex moved closer to her, so that their faces were inches apart, befor sinking to his knees to examine the shoes. He nodded a little,

"Yes." He decided eventually as his boring shoes changed themselves into converse trainers, "I like these shoes."

Even though and had herself looked at his eyes intently when they had first met the continuing lock on her eyes made her a little uncomfortable, moving through the room to look out of the dust encrusted windows at the night fall approaching.

"I can guarantee you that I have heard strange things."

Turning to face him side on she continued to think about whether he was going to be a threat or not.

"You're not the strangest person I've met."

Rebecca gasped slightly and she stepped back from Alex as he stepped closer to her, she wondered why he needed to invade her personal space in order to look at her shoes and she furrowed her brow as his shoes changed.

"How do you do that?"

Alex laughed happily as she said she'd heard strange things. He wiped a tear away several seconds later, when the giggles had died down, and shook his head,

"Girl..." he grinned, "You don't even know what strange is compared to me. I've seen some shit that's just been batshit crazy."

He shrugged a little as he looked at her out of the corner of his eye with a smile,

"I can promise you now that I'm the strangest thing you'll ever see." he told her, putting emphasis on the 'thing' part, "You won't see anything like me for as long as you live. You could live to a hundred and still never see anything as weird as me."

Alex ignored her indignation about him getting so far into her personal space, he shrugged a little,

"I had to get the details right." he told her with a smile, "It's part of the weirdness. Are you sure you want to know?"

Rebecca turned to face Alex properly and she placed her bag back on the floor as she did so, she was getting to the point where she actually wanted to talk to Alex rather than him trying to talk to a brick wall. His laugh it appeared was infectious and Rebecca held back her own but a smile cracked her face.

"Same here you know, but I will take your word for it, you know better than me obviously about what you are."

Smiling softly Rebecca bit her lip and she shrugged her shoulders, it was a little weird that he didn't just ask before doing that. Maybe he was just a little bit lax on his people skills or something.

"That makes sense I suppose."

With a nod of the head and a fleeting smile on her lips Rebecca waited to hear just what this guy was, maybe a mental case? It would make sense the way he was behaving.

"The suspense is killing me." she chuckled, although it wasn't a complete lie, she was interested.

As Rebecca set her bag down on the floor, Alex smiled a little more at her much more relaxed air. The way she held back a laugh made him smile even wider and, for some curious reason, make a warm feeling start in his chest cavity. Which was odd seeing as he hadn't finished making this body yet so the middle of his chest didn't have anything in it yet,

"Well I know only slightly more than you." he admitted with a small smile, which, he reflected, was quite a sad one, "The only one who knew everything about me abandoned me. A very long time ago."

He shrugged a little, smiling sheepishly,

"Sorry if I made you uncomfortable." he looked down at himself, "I'm not used to this yet... human interaction with anyone other than Cobie... being in control... yeah it's all pretty weird to me still."

Alex chuckled a little before sticking his hand out to her,

"Hi! I'm calling myself Alex Mason but that isn't my real name!" he told her with a smile, "I've never really known if I had a proper name and even if I did, no one alive is old enough to remember it. I've been in existance for longer than this school has been standing, although I spent most of that time on a stretch of beach on some deserted island. For the past 40 years I have been a symbiotic partner of Cobalt Julius Smith, who you know as Professor Smith and 'That strict bastard'."

Pausing for breath his smile widened a little and he gave her a wink,

"Now here's where it gets really freaky so hold on tight." he suggested with a smirk, before continuing, "I have no pulse. I have no blood. I have no permanent magical core, but I am a conduit for magic even better than a wand. I am not, technically, alive but have been sentient for longer than any building has been standing. I can, therefore, technically not be killed or even permanently incapacitated. I am not a human being in any sense of the phrase, but I have absorbed some of the mannerisms, thought patterns and customs of one through my link with Cobalt Julius Smith. I keep referring to him by his full name because if others do the same it will annoy him to no end, and that amuses me."

He grinned,

"I am not human." he clarified, "I am, in fact, a magical artifact of unknown age and nigh unlimited power. In my admittedly biased opinion I'm better than a philosopher's stone. After all, I can talk."

Rebecca couldn't help but return the smile that Alex gave her, it seemed as if this guy had managed to get past the wall that is Rebecca fairly quickly, which was a feat in itself, maybe it was because he was so utterly unlike anyone she had ever met before. And Rebecca had a sneaky feeling he was the only person he was going to meet like this.

"That must be frustrating for you, is there no way that you could find him? Or anything about you he might have written down? Although I presume you've already done that."

With a small nod of her head Rebecca waited for Alex to begin to tell her who exactly he was, which he seemed to have quite a fun time doing, and the more he spoke the more she thought that he probably shouldn't go around telling this to anyone and everyone he met.

Deciding it would be best to wait until he had finished talking Rebecca felt her eyes widen a little at some points and unable to stop a snort of laughter as he called Cobalt 'That Strict Bastard' but she quickly hushed up again. When he had finished Rebecca clasped his hand briefly, not doing the whole physical contact thing, then letting go.

"Well...you're right, that is the strangest thing that I have ever heard. You should get a medal or something."

Rebecca wondered what else to say, what could you say to that?

"So you just randomly decide to stop being a ball of metal to start living again? And when you're bored you go back to being a ball? Sounds ideal to me. You could be an adult though, or an older kid, so why do you make yourself like this?"

At hearing her concerns about him, especially regarding his creator, Alex blinked a few times in stunned surprise. He'd grown used to only Cobalt caring about what concerned him. He'd never told the man but the fact that Cobalt had spent five years after their first bonding trying to find out about his creation, and continued to do so in his free time, meant a lot to him. This girl, someone a fraction of the age he could even remember, was showing him some degree of care and that was new. It was different. It was... surprising,

"We looked. Cobalt and I, I mean." he told her quietly, suddenly feeling rather sullen at the topic, "5 years, Miss Holloway. Cobalt Julius Smith dedicated 5 years of his life, a finite quantity, to try and find something out for me. He found some things out but it didn't matter by that point. By that point I was too attached to him to go and do my original 'purpose'."

He smiled a little at her mention of a medal. A small, silver, medal appeared on the outside of his t-shirt. It looked to be pinned on by the medal, as well as the clothes, were actually just extensions of his 'body',

"This good enough?" he asked her with a smirk before frowning a little and changing the medal to broze, "I've never liked silver as a colour. Which is a bit of a problem seeing as it's my natural colour."

Alex shrugged, a little smile forming on his face as he stuck his hands into his pockets, which were also extensions of his 'body',

"Well technically I was never alive. So I've decided to become something more human to experience a life rather suddenly, yes." he paused for a few moments before shrugging, "I don't know why I chose this form to be perfectly honest. I suppose it's so that I didn't feel too much like Cobalt, which I would if I was an adult. Could you imagine a world with two Cobalts? I don't think the world is ready."

Rebecca twinges when Alex called her by her last name like she was some sort of teacher or something, she merely looked at the floor in silence as he spoke. In ways, she envied him, she wanted to be like him, she didn't want to know about her past anymore for it was that which haunted her.

"I see...well I'm sorry. Maybe you should start finding answers out for yourself, test yourself, see how old you are...hypnotherapy I don't know. Something will work."

Glancing swiftly up from the floor Rebecca said softly:

"Rebecca."

Unable to stop a small smile forming on her lips Rebecca knew Alex wouldn't see it, her hair covered her face and it was angled at the floor, so she smiled a little more. Indeed the thought was an odd one...but was it such a bad thing.

"I always liked Cobalt. Not that he ever said anything special to me. I don't expect him to."

Alex noticed a strange motion in her body that he realised was a twinge. It wasn't something he'd experienced in his new body so he decided to give it a try. After a few failed attempts he shrugged it off. Seeing her look at the floor though made him glance down and decide that there was nothing of any real importance on the floor so he moved on,

"Don't be sorry. It's not your fault so you have absolutely nothing to be sorry about." he shrugged a little at the next bit, "I used to try and measure my age by how eroded the beach around me got. I saw cliff-faces fall into the ocean a hundred times but I never could tell how old I was from it."

He paused as he looked into her eyes at her softly spoken announcement. Unable to find any reason not to, he nodded a little,

"Rebecca." He agreed quietly, "But then you must call me Alex."

Alex grinned at what Rebecca had said. He coughed and puffed out his chest jokingly,

"Well for that comment alone I know Cobalt would do this..." he ruffled her hair affectionately and continued, in a perfect imitation of Cobalt's voice, "That's the way to think Becca. Only expect praise when you have done something to deserve it. By realising this you have earned some praise, well done you."

Rebecca tried not to laugh but this was just such a strange conversation to be having, measuring your age by the rocks around you, that was a pretty sad thing to say if you asked her.

"You should forget then, start new."

She wasn't exactly sure when it was that Rebecca had stopped talking, all she knew was that she had done so, in fact, this was the most that she had spoken in a while, a good long while at that.

"Alex." Rebecca nodded

With the touch to her head Rebecca moved away from Alex, her eyes flashing and her hand going to her wand. At what he said she couldn't help but laugh a short cold laugh. Cobalt didn't know a thing about how hard she worked and how much she deserved praise.

He saw her trying not to laugh and smirked a little. Many a time, Cobalt had assured him that trying to measure your age by how many pebbles around you were eroded away to nothing every year was not only impractical but also rather amusing, if a little sad,

"I did." he shrugged a little, "But when you're on a beach you don't really have access to a calander. So I started from when Cobalt and I first bonded. That means I'm still a lot older than you."

Alex raised an eyebrow as she flinched a little and her hand went to her wand. Almost automatically his mind switched to what Cobalt had dubbed his 'threat or liability' mode. It was simple. When either of them lipped into this line of thinking then every living thing in the world was either a threat or a liability. He assessed her as an unknown threat and had halfway thought of a line of attack before he realised that the situation would be best defused if he didn't touch her. He drew his hand away,

"Sorry Rebecca." he said simply, back to his normal voice but in an uncharacteristically sober tone. He looked around the room they were in before his expression brightened slightly, "Any idea where I can buy clothes?"

Rebecca saw Alex smirk and she wondered why her heart leapt a little bit, true he was attractive but she shouldn't really be looking at that, I mean he said himself he has no insides yet! He's a metallic rock! Sighing softly Rebecca nodded at what he said, it did make sense.

"Well at least now you have calendars."

Tilting her head to one side Rebecca had a thought occurrd to her and she let it develop in her mind until she didn't think she could hold it in any more:

"Why didn't you leave?"

Rebecca moved her hand away from her wand as Alex moved away from her, nodding in response to his seemingly sincere apology she crossed her arms around her chest like a barrier.

"Muggle shops, London is the best bet. Just robes here."

Alex saw her body language become lighter for some reason but couldn't think why so he just kept on smiling. He watched as she sighed, her the expression releasing more tension from the simple admission that they were both right about the age thing,

"Yeah..." he stuffed his hands in his 'pockets', "But Cobie wouldn't let me get the kitten calender. Apparently Monty Python is funnier."

As Alex was contemplating how he was going to pay for the clothes she'd show him, she asked him that simple question. He froze up, his entire body becoming completely still. How to explain it? That was the hard part,

"It's hard to explain." he told her quietly, "I just... I felt like I had to stay there. Like I was waiting for something. And that feeling only went away when Cobalt appeared so... well I guess that was part of my purpose."

Seeing her relax a little more, Alex smiled a little more and regained some more of his lighter attitude. But when she crossed her arms, her body language stiffened more. Alex sighed a little but realised it was probably the best he was going to get,

"Well alright then. Muggle london it is." he paused for a mintute before looking around, "Not to seem stupid but... where are we?"

Rebecca grinned for a moment then swiftly covered it, it was just a little weird, a centuries old rock wanted to buy a kitten calendar, why not eh? Everything else about him just seemed as random so why not throw in a kitten calendar in there?

"Kittens? You like them?"

She saw how Alex seemed to relax more as she did so tried to make sure that she didn't freeze up again but even as Rebecca was thinking this she saw Alex freezing up at her question, worried shed upset him Rebecca opened her mouth to speak.

"I get it, don't worry I understand."

Rebecca smiled swiftly and as she gazed at Alex he seemed to be a little deflated at something deciding shed best just tell him the truth Rebecca said:

"I'm sorry, im not real good at conversations, this is the longest one ive had."

Directing her gaze at the floor now Rebecca grinned and she tried to lower her arms from around her chest: "They'll all be closed, it's late, and you're in the Shrieking Shack."

Alex was quick enough to catch her grin but what puzzled him was her immediate action to cover it. It was a fun expression to do from what he'd found so far so it made no sense to him to not grin as much as possible. He grinned,

"Yeah, I like kittens." he stuck his tongue out at her, "Even living metal balls have to bow to the cuteness that is kittens."

He could see that she was worried about his reaction to the question and, to be fair, he couldn't blame her because he was worried about his reaction too. It has been a long time since he was that little pebble on the beach so the fact that it still got to him worried him a little. He looked away,

"It was a long time ago... and yet..." he closed his eyes, "And yet not. For hundreds of years that was my 'life'. It's shaped me."

He chuckled a little and shook his head, a small smile growing,

"Don't worry about it." he laughed a little, mostly at himself, "You're talking to a being who spent centuries talking to himself inside his own mind. Since then I've only really 'spoken' to Cobalt. And he's not exactly a normal conversationalist. He swears like a sailor in his mind."

Alex gave her a side-long glance, smirking,

"Who said I was going to pay?" he asked her with a deviant glint in his eye, "And I gathered the shack bit. The interior gives it away. But where is the shrieking shack?"

Rebecca couldn't help but let out a noise of laughter, only, it was more like a breath of it, not totally fulfilled but still it was the closest thing Rebecca had had for a laugh in so so long it seemed like an outbreak for her.

"They're okay, I wouldn't hurt one but I don't want one."

Biting her lip as she saw Alex go off into his own mind she wondered if she ever did that, it seemed sometimes she did but she was really just not talking, Rebecca wondered why it seemed that Alex couldn't control his emotions. Maybe he didn't want to. Maybe only her wanted to.

"The memory is still fresh dispite the age."

Rebecca nodded her head and clasped her arms around her chest again, the mention of Cobalt causing her to tense up again, it wasn't that she didn't like him, she just didn't know him. That put her on edge.

"He's Irish what did you expect?"

Tilting her head to one side Rebecca smiled swiftly and she shrugged her shoulders at what Alex said:

"On your own head be it. Just outside Hogsmeade."