“Hey Rian.”

Arian looked up from his book “Hmm?” The fifteen year old had a distracted look in his soft grey eyes, sunlight glinting off his hair and bringing out the different shades of red that made up its dark red shade.

“Do you remember how we first met?” The speaker was a small delicate-looking thing with cute pixie-like features that somehow managed to look slightly exotic what with the silvery markings on its face and soft-looking, wispy silver hair, bangs falling over the long thin antennae that grew out of it’s forehead and curled at the tips.

“Do you think I could forget?” Arian’s voice was slightly dry. “My life seems to have turned crazy ever since you decided to make yourself part of my life.” Arian smiled mischievously at the speaker’s pout “Not that crazy has been all that bad though…” His smile softened “After all I found you didn’t I Silyn.”

Silyn’s pout turned almost immediately into a grin, its silver eyes almost sparkling as it nodded “Yeah.”

Arian was given just enough time to place his book gently aside before the digimon launched itself into his lap. At first it had bothered him, Silyn’s touchy-feely-ness. Before Silyn it had been a while since he’d had that sort of affection, something that was tied up in dim memories of his mother’s touch… And Catrin and… Nain… He pushed those thoughts away looking down at the digimon in his lap. “Hey Silyn want to play a game?”

Silver eyes lit up in excitement “Can we?! Can we?!”
“Sure, I think there’s a checkers board somewhere around…”
“I’m bored of checkers” came the retort. “Lets play pick up sticks instead – I’ll go find some”

As Arian watch Silyn bounce off to go find some sticks he found his thoughts drifting, no longer interested in the book he’d put aside. It’s strange… It’s not been that long and yet now I couldn’t imagine him not around, couldn’t... His thoughts drifted back to that day, the day his path and Silyn’s had first crossed.

~ o ~ o ~ o ~

It had been raining, ok so that was nothing new. After all England was known for its rain and Bristol was located in England. In the Southwest to be sure and close to the border of Wales, but still England. School had finished half an hour ago, but Arian wasn’t in any particular hurry to get to his grandparent’s house and so instead of walking the twenty minutes that it took to get from school to small terrace where his grandparents lived, he’d turned in the opposite direction and headed for the downs up by Blackberry Hill. Ten minutes into the run it had started to rain… Typical English weather, although he hadn’t minded and it hadn’t deterred him – he needed the freedom that he could find in running too much to let falling water stop him… Besides he’d done the chores this morning and left dinner in the fridge. This was his time, one of the things he really had…

The Downs were deserted, not really surprising considering. Used as people were to the rain, it was something that in general they preferred to avoid. Something to sit out indoors rather than deliberately spend company with. Arian preferred it that way, this way he was alone with his thoughts, although the rain meant he wouldn’t be able to read the book he’d borrowed from the school library like he’d been vaguely planning to.

Eventually however the rain drove him to seek out the place he’d dubbed as his spot, it really was too wet to be running and his time or not his grandparents wouldn’t be happy if he ended up trekking mud into their house again. Not that it was really their fault, after all they were fairly old and they hadn’t wanted to have a boy underfoot even though they had taken him on when his father had left him there. He sighed to himself Not going there Arian.. Remember it’s your time and  your time isn’t for this…

He stumbled slightly as he scrambled over a few trees almost falling before managing to catch himself. It was an improvement over the first time – he’d actually fallen that time, managed to rip a hole in his new trousers something that had incurred the disapproval of both grandparents when he’d finally gone home. Still it was worth it to find someplace of his own. He laughed a little to himself as he reached the small circular building, ok so it belonged to the council but they’d never seemed to use it… In fact it seemed that no-one had used it in sometime, as the windows were broken and the small door – the official entrance was locked. Arian went for the unofficial entrance – a small grate in the side which with a little wriggling he was able to fit through, hands reaching for the flashlight he kept by the entrance on the inside. It didn’t even register that the grate hadn’t been in place… Well not until he switched on the flashlight and found the grate neatly pushed up against the wall. It most definitely hadn’t been him so…

The next thing that registered was the glow coming from the other room, he frowned considering that his flashlight barely lit up the room he was in it sure as anything wasn’t him, but maybe if there was someone in the other room he should go.. He could always go back to the house if nothing else.

It was his reluctance to go back to his grandparents home that in the end drove him to walk across the room towards the other slightly smaller room, that and a mixture of both curiosity and the logic that if there was anyone dangerous in here then they’d already heard him – he’d made enough noise scrambling around as it was. He didn’t get much further than the doorway before he froze, the flashlight slipping from nerveless fingers hitting the concrete floor with an ominous-sounding crack – after all it wasn’t everyday that one saw a pixie or whatever the heck the glowing thing was that was sitting on a stack of crates in a building that no-one used.

As Arian stood frozen in the doorway, the thing grinned cutely at him. “Lo.”

Arian removed his glasses, blinking as the world immediately went fuzzy and removing a slightly soggy tissue from his trouser pockets attempted to wipe them down before plonking them back on. No difference – there was still a small delicate-looking creature with features that matched the description of most descriptions he’d read about pixies in the mythology books he was so fond of borrowing from the library… Well that is except for the long, thick black curled antennae growing out of the things forehead and were those wings? He gave a moan.

The thing gave him a confused look “So you didn’t come here to get out of the rain too?”

Arian moaned again – obviously he was losing it – after all he’d just thought that the thing had spoken to him… For the second time. “I’m hallucinating” for a moment he contemplated trying to wipe down his glasses again. “I’m looking at a glowing pixy-like thing.”

The thing responded with an irritated, it’s voice slightly huffy “I’m not a pixy-like thing.”

“No” Arian retorted. “You’re a hallucination…” he stopped himself for a moment closing his eyes – had he just spoken to the thing? Wasn’t that a sign he was going crazy or something? He backed away, maybe if he left he could just.

A hand stopped his backwards movement – a soft hand, his mind noted absently even as he was trying to work out how he could touch something that was just a figment of his imagination.

“Please, don’t run” the voice sounded sad then and when Arian looked down he noticed the thing looked miserable, something that for some strange reason made him feel bad.

Arian hesitated, but when the thing uttered another “Please” he found himself giving in with a nod. Maybe it was something in its expression, maybe it was the fact that whether he was going crazy or not he didn’t want to hurt this thing… Even if it was only a figment of his imagination and thus not real.

“You’re wrong you know” the thing hadn’t let go off his hand, a strangely serious look on its face. “I’m as real as you are Arian.”

Arian stared. It had called him Arian… Not Andrew but Arian, a name that he hadn’t heard since he’d last seen Nain. “Wha..” he found him stammering. “How?”

“I’m Silyn” the smile was back. “Want to play pick up sticks with me?”

Arian found himself sitting down – hard. “How do you know that…”

Silyn had let go off his hand in favour of collecting sticks in the corner of the room. “Arian is your name isn’t it?”

Arian found himself nodding dumbly. Gods he really had lost it.

A bundle of sticks were dumped in front of him. “Lighten up and play pick up sticks with me Rian” Silyn was smiling at him.

“Rian?” He queried not sure how he’d ended up with a new nickname from something he barely knew.

“Play with me” Silyn’s voice was bordering on a whine.

The tone had Arian reaching for a stick. The first stick became another and another until at some point the pile collapsed. It was some time and three games later that Arian realised that the rain had stopped. He hadn’t had this much fun in a while, even if it was only pick up sticks.

He stood up to go, slightly reluctant to start the walk back to his grandparents home, only to have Silyn stand as well. It seemed to interpret his puzzlement, giving him a bright smile. “I’m coming with”

“What?!”

Silyn just continued to smile at him ignoring him when he mentioned that it had to stay, or that it couldn’t go where he was going. When he pointed out that figments of his imagination couldn’t just up and follow him home Silyn gave him an irritated look before insisting stubbornly it was going with him whether he wanted it to or not. He’d given up on arguing at that point.

~ o ~ o ~ o ~

“Hey Rian can we play now?”

Arian blinked to see Silyn carrying a bundle of sticks. “Sure.”

That single word made Silyn’s face light up and Arian mused that yes his life had gotten a heck of a lot weirder, with a whole lot of things he didn’t understand… Things he wasn’t sure he really wanted to understand. However Silyn had come out of it and so it wasn’t all bad, wouldn’t be all bad as long as Silyn wouldn’t leave him.