Drake squirmed as he watched the games below from his perch on the top row of what he had read were called bleachers. Apparently, humans were supposed to be punished for watching these things. Why else would they consider planks of hard wood fastened together by steel bars a suitable seating arrangement for an event that took hours to complete? He scanned the people in shiny uniforms below him as the threw an orange ball back and forth, occasionally throwing it into a basket that hung above their heads. Unfortunately, the baskets each had holes in the bottom, so they were forced to continue thrown the ball into  container that wouldn't catch it. [i]How pointless...[/i]

The human realm was confusing. Thankfully, it seemed that the time he had to spend here would be minimal. His eyes came to rest on one of the females in the game, a girl about his age with fiery orange hair and a brazen demeanor that could only mean one thing. [i]Yep,[/i] he thought. [i]She's a Fireborn.[/i] The girl ran up to the basket, shoving the orange ball into the air with what appeared to be all of her strength. It sailed above the others, who tried in vain to keep it from falling into what he dubbed the Basket of Uselessness. The ball entered the poorly-woven container, which as he suspected did not hold it even for a second. Then a long shrill whistle blew out, and people around him began to stand, putting their hands together over and over in some sort of strange human signal of approval.

The applause did not last long. The man with the whistle began screaming, dropping the orange ball to his feet as it melted. [i]They use rubber for those things![/i] He blinked indignantly. [i]And they let her play? Don't they know that rubber isn't fireproof![/i]

He turned back to the court, scanning it for any sight of the girl he had come for, but she seemed to have disappeared...