Don't go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first. --Mark Twain
oo00VDLTM00oo
Some believe that an animagus is a wizard who shifts into an animal form and that is it they believe wrong. Truthfully, an animagus is not all that different from a werewolf. Both actually have merged with the animal spirit their form is based on. Both carry the talents and abilities of their animal forms while human. Both can lose control to their animals for a time. The main difference is rather obvious however. The animagus can choose when to change while the werewolf usually can not.
The animagus with the form of a natural predator tends to have a bit more difficult of a time controlling his or her animal. In the instances where advanced levels of mental physical or emotional duress, the ferocity of the predator can be extremely dangerous to those around you, or extremely helpful as a weapon against one's enemies.
The control of the animal spirit is even more difficult for the rare animagus with multiple forms. Especially when both forms are predators. Unfortunately (or fortunately depending on point of view), our friend Jaxom was one of these rarities.
oo00VDLTM00oo
All of the faceless black hoods were focused on the figure in the grasp of their kin. Two of the more eager dementors closed in on the left and right of their latest meal, rotten lips slathered with stagnant drool of anticipation. Their empty sockets were so rapturously focused on the tiny sphere of blue energy floating from their prey's mouth, they didn't noticed the sudden build up of magic.
It was noticed, however, when the sphere raced back into the mouth and the eyes sprung open, burning with an intense blue light that drew the dementor's attention immediately. Jaxom's arms shot to the sides, a wave of magic blasting all but two of the vile creatures back. The two exceptions were kept in place by his clenching hands burying into their hoods and heads. With a heavy forward step, Jaxom viciously yanked his hands together across his chest. They pulled with them a trail of silicate from the hoods, rendering the rotten forms into a cloud of dust that blew away with the wind.
The other dementors, incapable of showing expression, radiated shock and horror over the destruction of their kin. Their prey, now turned predator, launched forward parallel to the ground. As his leap lowered, his palms and crooked fingers actually dug into the stone of the street. Muscles tensed as he flung himself forward. The only remaining conscious bystander watched on, amused, as Jaxom sprinted forth on all fours like a tiger mid-chase.
The dementors watched on as the human leaped with feline agility towards another of their number. They could no longer sense any emotion from their would-be meal. All they felt was an intense sense of survival.
The cat-like movements waned as Jaxom swung a mighty upward slash to the first dementor. A trail of dust followed the hand up from the bottom of the dark creature's form. As soon as the cutting strike went through the hooded head, the entirety of the cloaked body lost all cohesion and crumbled. The dark figures could clearly feel two volatile instincts warring to protect their vessel as the human-turned-beast immediately switched targets, dropping back into his low sprint. His next victim hovered, still confused, ten feet from the ground. Building up speed, he easily closed the distance.
Landing with his feet planted in the thing's frail chest, Jaxom raked his curved fingers through it's rotten throat. Launching off of the swiftly disintegrating body, he flew, fists extended and body as straight as an arrow, towards another. Not even trying to alter his trajectory, Jaxom drove every ounce of his body weight into the dementor's head. As the now decapitated soul sucker fell to dust, the remaining number finally acted.
Half of the dementor forces fled before this threat while the others, intent on finishing the meal they had started, pressed forward. With their auras on full blast, they tried once again to overwhelm Jaxom. Because he was no longer operating with emotion, however, there was no effect as he stood still, back slightly hunched and right arm slightly swaying back and forth in preparation.
As soon as the first dementor got within arms reach, Jaxom swung his hand forward in a wide arc. The crushing blow caught the creature square in the chest. It exploded in a cloud of dust as a wide beam of blue energy erupted from its back. The remaining forces tried in vain to escape the onrush of magic as, one by one, they were encompassed and destroyed.
oo00VDLTM00oo
Alastor 'Mad-eye' Moody had faced many things in hid long career as an auror. During the first war against Voldemort, for instance, he had seen and felt the effects of the dementors so often that he was all but immune to them. It was this fact that enabled him to witness the power of this familiar wizard.
Oo00VDLTM00oo
As the light faded and the dust fell, Jaxom was crouched low, fingertips resting on the street between his feet. Seeing no additional threats, the animals within him receded from his consciousness, granting him control once again. Slowly rising from his crouch, he took stock of his surroundings with his newly restored human perception. Suddenly, he spun around, pulling one of his pistols, and fired one shot.
"You know, Jax..." stated Moody as he glanced down at his false leg and the new hole that resided with in it, "that might have hurt if you'd hit my real leg."
"Please! You wouldn't have flinched and you know it, Mad-beard." rebuked the young man as he strode towards Moody.
"I hope you realize that, if anyone else called me that I'd beat 'em with my false leg."
"Yeah, but you love me like a grandson. You wouldn't beat me even if you could. And I'm fine by the way."
"I know..." Moody chuckled, "I was the man who trained you for most of your life."
"True." "Seriously though, I'm glad you finally learned to let your animal spirits take control when needed. I was actually worried that I'd lose my best student there for a second."
Jaxom clasped his mentor's forearm in greeting and then pulled the grizzled old auror into a hug. If anyone else had been awake, they would have been shocked to witness the paranoid senior return the hug with equal fervour.
"It's been too long, sir." the young warrior said, his voice thick with emotion.
After a few seconds, the two men released each other and walked off. As they turned into a deserted off-shoot of the alley, a multitude of pops were heard. They turned to see a squad of aurors.
"Would you look at that," laughed Jaxom. "They show up in time to clean up."
Their laughter reverberated through the small alley. Jaxom halted, however, when he caught site of a female auror with mousy-brown hair and a heart-shaped face. His heart skipped a beat when he saw the woman he loved. Just as quickly as he had started laughing, he immediately sobered. Moody, noticing his former pupil's sudden shift, threw his glance towards the auror.
"That's Tonks." he stated with the hint of a question in his voice.
"Yeah..."
Tension filled the small space until Moody decided to change the subject.
"Jax, have you made any progress?"
Before Jaxom could reply, Renth alighted on his shoulder and stared at the older man. Knowing what was expected, Moody pulled his wand, nonchalantly casting an AK at a nearby scurrying rat (No...not Wormtail). He summoned the lifeless body and tossed it to the fire lizard. Swallowing the tiny rodent whole, Renth released a resonating hum from deep in his throat.
Jaxom grasped his teacher's shoulder and they vanished with a slight gust, only to reappear in another alley that lay perpendicular to a busy muggle street. Before either could say a thing, they were distracted by an argument coming from deeper within the alley.
"Please! I wasn't watching him! I just happened to look in his direction!"
"Shut the fuck up! I warned you about looking at other men! When will you ever learn!" the last word was punctuated with a hard slap.
Looking toward the source of the sounds, Moody and Jaxom saw a woman of about twenty-five and a man of thirty or so. He had a vice-like grip on her shoulder. Where her shirt sleeve was being pulled up , several deep purple bruises along her arm could be seen. Her tear-stained face was branded with a harsh red hand print and one eye was beginning to swell.
Jaxom growled how in his throat as he began walking towards the pair. Renth leaped from his shoulder to alight on the top of Moody's walking stick. The unorthodox pair glanced at each other before turning to watch their incredibly pissed off friend stalked away. Just as the man reeled back to slap the woman again, a hand shot out of nowhere and grabbed his wrist hard. He was jerked off of his feet and into a pile of garbage bags as Jaxom stepped between him and the shocked woman.
"Are you alright?" he asked her.
"Why did you do that?!"
"huh?"
"You could have seriously hurt him!" she declared, rushing to the man's side and helping him up.
"Hurt him! He was just beating you like his dick on a lonely night for no good reason!" Jaxom said incredulously.
"He just gets like that sometimes." she muttered, supporting the man as he shook his head to clear the cobwebs.
"He beats you regularly?! Then why the fuck are you with him?" "Look pal..." started the man with a shit-eating grin plastered across his face. "You need to lear your place. She already knows hers. Why don't you run along while I take her home and..."
The man's smug attitude was what sealed the deal as Jaxom's tension from the dementors and seeing Dora snapped. He lunged forward, wrapping his hand around the man's neck. Without moving the rest of his body, Jaxom viciously wrenched his arm back, sending the ass stumbling past him and into the opposite wall of the alley face first. With an angry growl, Jaxom spun around and grabbed the back of the man's head.
The woman watched on, frozen in fear and awe as the stranger repeatedly slammed her boyfriend's face into the unyielding brick wall. The look on his face was one of pure rage and sorrow as tears slowly leaked from behind the reflective sunglasses.
"You! Don't! Treat! People! Like! Possessions!" Jax grunted with each collision of the asshole's face and the wall.
With a final meeting of flesh and brick, Jaxom dropped the bloody pulp of a man and turned to the woman. She could have sworn that the outside of his sunglasses were glowing a faint blue as he stood staring at her.
"I don't know what you're trying to prove by staying with this piece of moldy horse shit here," he rumbled, gesturing behind him to the masticated face on the ground. "but you need to wise the fuck up and ditch his ass. By staying with him just for him to mistreat you like that, all you're proving is that you're so stupid you deserve to be seen as thing."
With that, Jaxom stormed off, muttering something that sounded suspiciously like 'stupid bitch'. He made his way past Moody and Renth and out of onto the busy street. With a questioning look to Renth, Moody sedately followed his extremely angry surrogate son.