Chapter Text
The newest advertisement in the town square went largely unnoticed by the vast majority, most people preoccupied with getting to their locations as fast as possible before the incoming storm entered the space proper.
The exception was a young avian with silver wings, who stopped and stared at it briefly before shaking their head, opening up their umbrella before taking off, and a short dwarf, who looked much more excited as their eyes locked onto the colourful paper.
–
This was the chance he was looking for!
Elated, Impulse Esve ran down the street, barging back into his house and beelining it for his room, temporarily deaf to his father yelling at him from the kitchen, followed shortly by muffled thumping as the older dwarf climbed the stairs after him.
Scrabbling underneath his bed, Impulse yanked out his schoolbag, emptying it of everything except his tools and a journal and pen. He had no time to properly change out of his uniform, and yanked his tie off and away as his father’s footsteps got closer. He stuffed his slippers and an extra change of clothing into it before yanking open the window, shoving his head out and mentally calculating the fall.
8 foot drop, but there were rough handholds he’d carved into the stonewall a year prior, and the grass would cushion his fall.
“WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU’RE DOING?” his father’s voice boomed as his door was slammed open, and Impulse chanced a glance behind him even as he slung his schoolbag over his shoulder.
Esve Senior looked pissed, and his hands went to grab as Impulse as he swung over the rim of his window, hands immediately going to find the divots in the wall. He managed to yank his feet away before his father could grab him, and found that he didn’t actually care when his shoes fell to the ground, burying themselves into the dirt.
“GET BACK HERE BOY!” Esve Senior bellowed, and Impulse tuned him out as he made his way down the wall, years of military climbing practice coming in handy. He kicked off his socks as soon as he touched the ground, and made a run for it just as the front door opened, his father giving chase.
–
His father knew the streets better than he did, and as the rain started to fall Impulse grit his teeth, forcing himself to run faster as he ducked into an alleyway, making short work of the brick wall at the end and dropping into a roll.
Banking left and narrowly avoiding crashing into a startled water spirit, Impulse ran into the Grainery.
He had the upper hand here- Impulse used the building to skip lessons when he could, and had years of practice of dodging and weaving through the workers. By the time he reached the back door, and looked behind him, his father was nowhere to be seen, lost in the crowd.
He grinned to himself, and yanked the door open, sprinting into the field and in the direction of the tents.
For once, he found that he actually relished the feeling of water hitting his skin, soaking him to the bone.
He was free!
–
He was panting and huffing by the time he reached the Hermatrix proper, ducking underneath the sign set up front, and he slowed to a walk as his eyes cast around, trying to find the black and yellow trailer mentioned in the advertisement.
The circus wasn’t dead, precisely, but there wasn’t anyone outside either, and he shivered as the cold started to set in, feet crunching through the thin layer of frost that hadn’t managed to be dispelled this morning.
“You look lost,” a quiet voice informed him, and he startled, instinctively going into battle-stance before realizing what he was doing.
The speaker in question was a female avian with off-white and grey wings, her face feathers ruffling as she spoke through the screen-door of the trailer he was next to. There was something unsettling about her distant gaze even as she looked right at him, and he cleared his throat. “Erm, uh, yeah- I was. I was looking for the uh-,” “The advertisement, right?” the avian interrupted, and he nodded, blushing furiously. “I’ll be out in a minute then. X’s trailer’s hard to find when it’s right up against Etho’s,”