Ain't Cutting no Ice [Gin/Alain/Mami/Jack Mitchell]

[Gin Yatreg]

Supporting Gin with his arms wrapped around their necks, Lubbock and Mami escorted him back to the makeshift den that they had created.

"--I mean you would think a midget *hic* wouldn't fit into one of those, but with a little work you ca--"

"Please tell me he's sober" Alain asked, cutting Gin off.

Mami and Lubbock shook their heads and set Gin down against a wall. "Yeeeah, I think we outta wait a bit before heading out. I doubt he'll be of much use like this." Lubbock said with a sigh.

"Hey who're ya callin' a sober yah . . . red . . . riding hood!" Gin mumbled in his drunken state.

Alain placed a hand on his forehead and sighed, "Yeah he seems to have had too much gin.", he paused to let the pun sink in. He then turned his gaze over to Urist at the other side of the room, "Is it alright if we wait a night, Urist?" he shouted over to the dwarf.

"Aye, but the longer we wait, the harder it'll be to find tha dragon again." Urist said

Alain turned back to his party members, "Well, you heard the dwarf. Wanna just leave Gin here?"

At that moment, Gin sprung to his feet. "Don't even think about leaving me out of a dragon hunt!" he shouted, with a startlingly sober tone.

The group stared at Gin, confused as to how he sobered up so quickly. Gin looked around at saw everyone staring at him, "What's everyone staring at?" he asked innocently.

Mami spoke first, "Gin, how are already sober?" she asked.

"Oh, that? There was an. . . accident back home." the boy paused and made a slight frown as he thought of home and the state he left it in. He continued, "And one of the side effects was that it sped up my metabolism. Why do you think I eat so much?"

"But...that's not..." Alain tried to say, at a loss for words.

"Come on guys! Let's go bag us a dragon!" Gin shouted as he ran off to wake up Tonic.

"There is something very wrong with that boy." Alain thought.

"Oh, and don't think I forgot about that using me as bait comment!" Gin shouted at them from the other side of the room.

Lubbock gave a nervous laugh and shrugged it off before following Gin over to where Tonic and his Dragon were currently napping. Alain and Mami followed suit, moving to their own areas of the cave to get ready for the groups expedition into the wild winter wonderland where wrathful wyverns wait.