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West was running. He had been running every morning since his stint in Fitness Club forced him to come to the conclusion that he was as out of shape as, well, Barth probably was. He didn't know. Maybe the sloth demon was a distance runner or something, but West doubted it very sincerely.

He continued to run. He ran past the Undead dorms and the Reaper dorms and the Ghost dorms, down to the forest where... who was that? There was an extremely pale ghoul nosing around all by herself at the edge of the tree line. Remembering the last time he had picked a fight with a strange ghoul, West almost turned and started back to his dorm, but he stopped himself, partially because he was curious about this weird student he had never seen before, but mostly because he was tired.

"Hey!" he called, jogging halfheartedly over to the tatzelwurm and narrowing his eyes at her. "What're y'doin'ere?"

What was it with ghouls and his horns? West made a slight sound of disgust as this odd student pinched at one of them, and he backed away a touch. It wasn't like he could feel her fingers or anything, he simply had no desire to be manhandled by someone he had just met.

"Critter? What?" he said, his brows dipping slightly at the center with his usual scowl. "I'ma demon," he said, a hint of haughtiness slipping into his tone. He might not have dwelled on it as often as others of his ilk, but West was actually a bit proud of his heritage and grateful that his kind had a clear and necessary purpose. He wasn't quite sure what he would have done with himself if he awoke one day to find he was a monster or a ghost. Not hat he knew what to do with himself as it was, but he hoped Amityville would help him with that eventually.

"What kinda... critter're you?" he parroted, flicking a finger at one of her fluffy white ears.

"Tatzel? Hmm'ey!" He had been formulating a scathing reply, something suitably snarky for this... tatzel to chew on, when she grabbed his tail with hers and pulled on it like he was one of those silly talking human toys his uncle had gone on about once after one too many glasses of screaming whine.

He tried to free his tail by its strength alone, but she was right on that front at least. West's tail wasn't made for grabbing and yanking. At best, it helped him balance and could be used as a whip in emergencies, at worst, it was simply decorative.

"Looks'kin be deceivin'," he said with a smirk of his own. "I can't..." He paused, glaring behind him at her pale, invading tail. "...do whatever tha'is. But I'm strong'nuf fer you." West punched his fist into his opposite palm and narrowed his eyes at the ghoul.

He scoffed when she asked him to speak slower. West was vaguely aware that he tended to rush, well, everything, but he firmly believed that life was too short to take one's time. Even with the knowledge that this was his philosophy, he rarely thought about his tendency toward haste. It was a part of him, as much as his near-constant anger. The funny thing was, he had never actually been called on it. Not that she was one to talk. West was having to pay more attention than usual in order to decipher her backwoods drawl.

"Too quick fer ya, kitty?" he sneered. His voice trailed off slightly as she let go of his tail only to stand on her own and...

The sound West made when Levi's feet made contact with his chest was a cross between an oof and an urk. Damn ghouls and their damn surprise attacks! He really needed to start anticipating these sorts of things, especially when he was the one provoking them. He staggered back, bringing a hand to his chest. He coughed. He smiled.

"b***h."

West lunged for the ghoul, throwing all of his strength into a punch that he hoped would land... somewhere. The urge to smash was rising and he honestly wasn't all that interested in the specifics anymore.

Taking another hit to his vulnerable midsection so soon after the first probably wasn't the best idea. West shrugged off the pain, as always, but his chest and stomach felt looser somehow, like they had attracted the attentions of a meat tenderizer. The ghoul hit hard.

This was going to be fun.

Or maybe not.

West frowned down at the tatzel after she fell. "Come at me'gain'n I'll showya how," he muttered. If she went down that easily, making ghouly eyes and excuses, maybe she wasn't as tough as he thought. He huffed out a disgruntled sigh, then turned to leave. "Y'ain't worth m'time."

What? Had she lost her mind? West had the inclination to turn back around to ask her what in the hell she was talking about, he was just about to, in fact, when - FWOOMP! - a squirmy, crushing weight slammed into his back. The ghoul knocked him forward and he almost fell over, but managed to catch himself before they both ended up in the dirt.

He shouted once as she started to choke him, then punched at her legs where they were curled around his stomach. This was not happening.

"Not... again," he grated, refocusing his pummeling attempts from her legs to her arms. He began to skitter backwards, as quickly as he could without toppling, in the hopes that he would miraculously back into a tree and crush this ghoul's spine.

West gulped in a mouthful of air when her grip loosened for that split second, then he foolishly used most of that breath to scream out a string of progressively more violent curses. At least he had managed to get a proper hit on her again, but if she kept strangling him like this, he was going to go down sooner rather than later. He had no intention of going down.

It was time to take drastic action.

Ever since he had learned they existed, West had hated his wings. His father's were proper wings in his opinion, large and black with liberal spatterings of deep red at their feathery tips. Most of the time they could barely be seen, but they never truly went away, and unlike West's they could be used anywhere, not just where there was enough FEAR. The boil had inherited his mother's pale, fluffy monstrosities and although they were fine on a ghoul, he thought they were an utter embarrassment on him. Truth be told, he might have grown to like them over the years if his parents hadn't made fun of the things every time he was forced to use them.

West let go of her arms and stopped beating at her legs, using what remained of that breath he had taken to sprint forward and leap into the air, his wings flaring into existence with their customary drop in air pressure. Because of her proximity to his back, they had appeared further away from him than he was used to and he flapped wildly to compensate. He vaguely hoped a sudden wall of white feathers in combination with the slap of branches from the surprise tree they were flying through (hello tree!) would surprise her enough to let go.

Admittedly, the whole tree idea had been a poor one, but that was probably because it was less of an idea and more of a mistake. The move earned him a handful of breaths at least, but as West prepared to turn around and dive, his new ghoul backpack used her considerable tail strength to fling them upward at what was, for a moment, a truly face-melting speed.

His stomach dropped as they shot higher, and even though he had been raging on the ground, West found that he was grinning in the air. He certainly hadn't lost this fight yet, and he wasn't planning on doing so. It was somehow easier to see that from up here where there was nothing else to see. This was kind of fun, but, like so many other things, that was not something he would readily admit. It wasn't every day he found someone so willing to challenge him.

They hung in the silent air, a good distance above the trees, and then instead of diving properly, West closed his wings a touch and they swiftly began to fall. Let's see how she liked plummeting to her potential death.