Borealis Eight - Coy Crossings

     "Show me where you found that bottle of champagne," Ember said to Aurora as she lifted the girl back onto the rooftop. "You're not supposed to have that. No one's supposed to have that, but, yet, you have it. Or, rather, you had it."
     Aurora noted a slight flicker in Ember's eyes that denoted interest and glee over the curt, half angry tone the girl was using to address her. When Aurora first found the bottle of champagne the day before, she had known that it was going to draw her some unwanted attention, nothing she couldn't have handled, she'd thought, but certainly not this much attention.
     Sitting on the roof now, Aurora made herself comfortable and rested her hands in her lap. "Well," she said thoughtfully. "I suppose I could show you."
     "Good," Ember said. "Then, let's go."
     "But..." Aurora stood up. "As you suggested, I know not of who you are, nor do I know where you come from." She began to slowly walk a circle around the strange blonde girl. "You have an odd way of conducting yourself, and none of your motives are apparent to me. Do you even know why you threatened to drop me off the side of the building?"
     No response, only a stare that followed Aurora without blinking.
     Aurora stopped. "You are odd."
     "And you're a healthy looking girl that's never seen an ounce of trouble in her life." Ember smirked, breaking from her serious tone. "And you're as dumb as a rock."
     A smile worked its way onto Aurora's face. She liked this girl. She was not boring at all. What a breath of fresh air. Aurora was so used to the way the people of the four factions always dealt with her, directly and obviously. Ember liked Aurora, too. It had been quite a while since she had come across anyone who was even remotely intelligent. She just hadn't expected Aurora to sound so smart. There were no schools, let alone teachers and books, on the city's outside, after all. Flummoxed, both girls stood in amazement of one another, wondering what the other was going to say or do next.
     Meanwhile, the sun had almost completely disappeared from the sky by this point, and the city's lights were beginning to flicker on. Below, factories were growling their way into animation and the streets were gorging themselves with the pollution that would later float its way into the night sky. It wouldn't be long now before the factions rested their dirty heads on the concrete of Borealis and took their leave of the day, and the Business Types would soon begin lifting their heads from their criminally soft pillows only to drone their way into their night's day. How funny it was, then, that Ember suddenly had to stifle a yawn as Aurora simultaneously widened her eyes in response to the energy rising up inside of her.
     The irony of the situation was not lost on the girls. So, Ember cocked her head to one side and said, "Friends?"

Borealis Seven - Curiousity Hangs

     Evening crept in, as did the oranges, yellows, and purples it often carried with it, pulling away the clear blue of the daytime's sky to make room for the night's dark. Aurora dangled from the side of a tall building. A hand held her left ankle. It was the only thing that prevented her from meeting the filthy streets below. Aurora stared down at these streets. They were about as boring as her day had been, at least in her opinion. She had slept through most of the day, after all, and the parts that had been punctuated by consciousness had been far too violent and haphazard for her liking.
     Aurora looked up, bored with the view below, and saw Ember, a short, blonde headed girl who had clean, white clothes on, not to mention a clean face with a clean head of hair. Now, that was something interesting, indeed. What faction could she possibly belong to? She was short enough to be a Roof Rat, tough enough to be a Riser Dog, quiet enough to be a Sun Cat, and clever enough to be a Grounder Bird. Aurora didn't know quite what to make of the girl.
     "You're probably wondering what or who the hell I am," Ember said, glaring down at Aurora with a slight smirk. "Well, I'm obviously not going to tell you anything out here..." She glanced behind her at the fleeing Riser Dogs she had just beaten away. "Too many ears..."
     Out here? What did she mean by "out here," Aurora wondered. She couldn't think of a single "in here" that they could even go to on the rooftops of Borealis. Of course, it was entirely possible that this girl was a Business Type, which would explain her cleanliness, but there had never been a known instance of a Business Type emerging from within the city walls to explore the outside of the city ever. Then again, Aurora thought, how on earth could any of the four factions on the outside know that any sort of people existed on the inside if no one had ever seen someone from the inside before? It didn't add up.

Borealis Six - Bad Zephyrs

     Wind. Wind lashed and howled itself around Aurora's face, pulling and tugging, waking her up as it curved around her body and tattered her hair. All vision was blurred as though in a blended, mixed up, drunken stupor that was still spinning. Smells darted this way and that way and all the way up into Aurora's olfactory, reminding her that she had fallen to the Riser Dog's wrangle. She had lived... But how she had lived, she knew not! And, were it not for the speed that she traveled in the arms of the Dogs, she could have sussed out the answers she asked of calamity.
     Oh, and buildings and buildings were going up and plummeting down. The Riser Dogs bounded from roof top to roof top, never maintaining a straight line for fear that the other factions of the city would notice their rare live catch. If the Dogs thought Aurora special, then certainly she was. Certainly, she could be learned from. And, certainly, she could be toyed with. Hence, the Riser Dogs needed to deliver their catch as soon as possible. They needed to know what their leader, Sheer Wolf, might discern from this Roof Rat's exploits. They needed to know if her information could help them find a way into the buildings that caged their clan in the open air.
     Sadly, what they needed and what they wanted were two entirely different things. From Ember's perspective, the four leaping figures she saw didn't need Aurora at all. They just wanted her. Yes, it was really Ember who needed the girl, and she aimed to take her. So, down she went onto the Riser Dog pack. And, down Aurora went from the Riser Dogs' hands. A fight then ensued, and Aurora was won.