Towards what is perfect and cannot, the tempest tells me, disappoint.

The gaping maw grew wider and wider as it bore down on Ethan. He was so frozen that he couldn't even scream.

But then, bizarrely, the creature stopped, but the mouth continued to widen. The black emptiness expanded, filling up the grey shape. As Ethan watched, helpless, the two black eyes seemed to frown in confusion, and then become absorbed by the swelling hole of the mouth. With a sudden 'pop' the mist creature seemed to fall back into itself, almost as if it had swallowed itself. In a moment, the darkness diminished down to a point, and then vanished. Ethan stared at the figure which replaced it.

Benny grinned, and waved the nozzle he was carrying. "Who ya gonna call?"

Ethan laughed, and realised from that that he was no longer frozen. He looked around. With the disappearance of the mist, he found himself sitting in a puddle of melt water. Even the iced over road was melting around him.

Getting, unsteadily, to his feet, and dripping slightly, Ethan frowned at the tube in Benny's hand. "What is that?"

"A positron accelerator," said Benny, proudly.

Ethan snorted. "Yeah, right." He stepped a little to the side to see more clearly what was strapped to Benny's back. "It's just your grandma's hoover."

Benny blushed. "Yeah, but –" he broke off, and became more flustered "- uh, it's a magic hoover!"

Ethan raised an eyebrow. "How?"

"Well, for a start, it contains the mist. Pretty useful for you, huh?"

Ethan nodded. "Thanks for that…"

Benny smiled. "That's what I'm here for! Now, where's Rory? I can't believe that he just abandoned you to this thing." Benny jerked his head back towards the hoover bag.

Ethan started, his eyes widening as he remembered. "Rory – Rory led it down the other path. I think it split in two." He looked worried. "But there could be a lot more of them if it can do that."

Benny nodded. "Well, we'll find Rory, and then –"

"Benny?" interrupted Ethan.

"Yeah?"

"Found him." Ethan pointed. Along the street came Rory, moving at an impressive speed, and with another formless shape chasing.

"How did he get there from – Ah, forget that!" said Benny, springing forwards with his hoover. Rory, clearly unable to stop on the ice, skidded past him until he reached the melted part by Ethan, at which point he abruptly toppled flat on his face. Benny, meanwhile, had activated his device (well, pressed the on switch of his vacuum cleaner) and was pulling the fog into the nozzle. After a strange slurping sound, that section of the monster was gone as well.

Beaming, he turned around in triumph to the other two. "This is easy!" he grinned. "I wonder how many more there are."

Rory shrugged, getting up from the slushy ground. "It definitely split into a few pieces as it chased me." He looked, amazed at Benny. "Is that a positron –"

"No," said Ethan, cutting Rory off mid-stream. Benny pouted, but was soon mollified by a sly smile from Ethan. "I think we need to get ourselves some more, and hunt down this mist."

"Has anyone ever hunted mist before?" asked Rory, absently.

Benny looked at him warily. "I wouldn't think so, no..." He paused, and then shook his head vigorously. "Come on!" he cried. "Back to Ethan's house!" He pointed dramatically, and marched off down the street.

"Uh, Benny?" called out Ethan. "My house is that way."

Picking carefully past the frozen people in the hall, Ethan, Benny, and Rory made their way over to the cupboard under the stairs. Ethan opened it, and pulled out a really old vacuum cleaner, followed by an even older one. Both were covered in dust, which had frozen to them, making them glitter oddly.

"Snazzy," said Benny, sniggering a little as he saw them. "Ooh, and one pink and shiny and one blue and –"

"Mine!" said Ethan, quickly grabbing the blue one. Scowling, Rory reluctantly picked up the pink one. Benny waved his hands over them both and muttered a few words.

"OK, we're ready to bust some gho – I mean, suck up some mist!" He wrinkled his nose, unsatisfied. "It doesn't really trip off the tongue, does it?" he looked up. "Ethan? Where are you going?"

A moment later, Benny found out as Ethan slid down the frozen bannister, a broad grin on his face. "Wheee!"

Stumbling off at the bottom, he looked around and reddened at the startled looks of the other two. "Um…"

Benny just raised an eyebrow. "Why did you go up there?"

Ethan tossed him a walkie-talkie, and then another one a Rory. He held up a third of his own. "If we're going to end this, we've got to hunt down the whole of the thing. We've got to close in. If we split up and converge on the school from three directions, then we can eliminate it, and, hopefully everything will go back to normal."

Benny and Rory nodded and clipped their radios to their belts. "Got it!" said Rory, taking a pair of sunglasses out of his pocket, placing them on the bridge of his nose in way that he thought was cool, and shouldering his hoover.

"Uh, Rory … why?" said Ethan, after a long pause.

Rory beamed and shrugged. "Why not?"

"True," said Benny, striding towards the door. "Right, then – montage time!"

This time it was Ethan and Rory's turn to look confused. "What?" they chorused.

"Well, OK, it would work if this was a movie!"

… Ethan crept down the darkened corridor, past towering shelves of books, the icy pages clinking together in the faint breeze. Breathing very softly, he followed the trail of thicker ice around the corner, his hand hovering over the button. He readied himself to jump out …

… The frigid street was silent. Benny stared around, waiting. Leaning against a tree, he whistled nonchalantly, hands in his pockets. From the sides of three different buildings, long streams of mist began to issue. He grinned, and lifted the nozzle of the vacuum cleaner …

… The column of mist came to a halt in the middle of the road, and turned around, its black, hollow eyes looking confused. It was so sure that the blonde boy had come this way. Subsiding a little in disappointment, it began to glide off back where it had come from. It must have missed a turning somewhere.

"A-hem."

The mist contorted, bending backwards so that it could look straight up at where the sound had come from. The gaps of its eyes widened in surprise.

Rory smiled, baring his pointed teeth, and switched on the hoover. The mist creature gave out a little wail, followed soon after by the distinctive 'pop' as it vanished …

… 'Pop'. A flutter of damp pages filled the quiet library. A set of footsteps could be heard echoing down the hall …

… 'Pop'. 'Pop'. 'Pop'. Benny reached the end of his tune and walked calmly down the road towards the school. "Section 12 cleared, over." …

Eventually, the three of them came to the end of Whitechapel's three major roads. The school gates stood in front of them. In front of the gates reclined the pale figure of Mr Hilt.

"Evening, boys," he said. "You seem to have had some success." His calm face twisted a little in anger, and his outline became a little fuzzy. He smiled. "But there's nothing you can do with those toys when I'm in this form." He paused. "Just as, admittedly, there's nothing that I can do to you."

"So," said Ethan, crossing his arms, "we find ourselves in a stalemate."

Glancing at the three of them, their erstwhile teacher hesitated, and then nodded, resignedly. "I –"

"You can leave," said Benn, decisively. "Now."

Mr Hilt raised an eyebrow. "Or…?"

With a flick of his wrist, Benny hurled a purple ball of fire at him. It passed through the man, leaving him completely unharmed. The gate behind him, though, was twisted out of recognition by the heat.

Mr Hilt's smile widened. "Again, or…?"

Benny scowled. "Uh…"

"I think," he said, silkily, "that we can come to an arrangement. All I want is a little peace and quiet. That's not much to ask, now, is it?"

Ethan narrowed his eyes, taking a few steps forwards with the others. "But you do it by killing people!"

"Not killing as such. Merely – hibernating. It doesn't have to be for long…" He glanced across at Rory, and stretched out a hand towards his chest. "And besides, death wasn't so bad, now, was it?"

He stroked the outline of Rory's knobbly scar. Rory's normally happy face hardened.

"You."

Mr Hilt spread out his hands in acknowledgement. "Who else? I tried to get the girl that you're hopelessly obsessed with to rip your heart out that night; she wouldn't play along, so I had to do it myself. I thought that if I got rid of you, then the others would be frightened off their little adventures. But they didn't even notice – so I sent them after you. But you forgave them. You went with them." He scowled. "You've all been too lucky – I thought dropping Ethan off a roof would teach you, but you went right on at it. You never learn. Any of you." He sneered at Rory again. "And you're the most bone-headed of the lot. You cling pathetically to the others even though they can't stand you – they were oblivious to your death, just as Erica is oblivious to your life. At least someone cares about them. You – you are –"

With a sudden snarl that grew into quite an unexpected roar, Rory flung himself forwards, drawing from his pocket a short, pointed object. He plunged it into the chest of the leering figure.

Mr Hilt looked down. Then he laughed. "You think that just because it's dramatically fitting, you can use the stake that killed you to kill me? How very naïve…" His chest became wispy, and the wooden spike dropped harmlessly to the ground.

"Yes," said Rory, calmly, "you are."

With that, he thrust the nozzle into the space where the stake had been and switched on the power. Mr Hilt's smug face collapsed into one of horror, before rapidly collapsing further into its mist form. Within moments, he had been entirely sucked into Rory's hoover.

'Pop'

Rory turned back to a shocked Ethan and Benny, his face very grave. There was a long silence. Then the two of them rushed towards him, embracing him in gratitude. Rory's expression dissolved into one of delight as he triumphantly hugged his friends. Around them, the ice dripped from the trees. As if a shiver ran through Whitechapel, everything slowly began to wake up.

The three of them paraded happily home, Rory borne on Ethan and Benny's shoulders. There was no crowd o cheer, but, at that moment, for Rory, it didn't matter. He had all he needed. Except for Erica, of course, and, as he thought in that buoyant mood, there was plenty of time for that. Eternity, in fact.

They reached Ethan's house, entering just as the party reanimated. Quickly shedding the hoovers, they slipped back into their places in front of the clock, noting the proud nod from Benny's grandmother. The ice fell from the second hand, and it finished its journey towards twelve. Marking the end of a considerable hiatus, the cheer went up:

"Happy New Year!"

After the celebration was over, and the food had been eaten; after the explanations given to Sarah and Mrs Weir; after the confusion over how light it seemed for midnight; after the surprise of the others on seeing the Erica of old (and her rapid encouragement of her parents to leave soon afterwards); after everyone else had gone home, and all three boys had received a parting kiss from Sarah, Rory, Benny and Ethan stood on the front step, looking out at the tranquil night.

"It's snowing," observed Ethan.

"For real. No magic," said Benny.

Rory grinned. "I love the snow." He looked, affectionately, at his friends, his familiar eager expression forming on his face. "Maybe if it keeps up, we can do something tomorrow?"

Ethan grinned. "Of course!"

"If you're making plans for tomorrow, boys, then we'd better be getting home, Rory," said his mum, coming out of the door.

"But I don't –" Rory stopped when Benny shot him a warning glance. "Uh – I mean, yeah, I don't want to miss sleep…"

Nodding, his mum and dad, walked off with him. Looking back, Rory waved manically. "Happy New Year!"

Benny and Ethan waved back, laughing to themselves. "Nothing wears him out, does it?" commented Ethan.

Benny nodded, and then yawned himself. He sat down, and glanced over his shoulder. "How long do you think Grandma will be?"

Ethan shrugged, and then, after a hesitant moment, sat down next to Benny.

Benny looked across at his friend and smiled. "Did you ever come up with a resolution?"

Ethan opened his mouth, went to answer, and then stopped himself. He tried again, and made a few noises, but nothing resembling speech. He went very pink, and then paused again, looking away.

"I – I –"

Benny watched, perplexed, as Ethan stuttered.

"It's OK, you don't have to –"

Ethan suddenly turned to face him, a new, determined, expression on his face. "Yes."

Benny raised an eyebrow. "Care to tell me?"

With a jerky movement, Ethan put his hand in his pocket and pulled out a crumpled piece of paper. After a moment of indecision, he thrust it at Benny, and then bent his head.

Benny unfolded it. He read the three words. He raised his eyebrows, and then looked across at Ethan. Well, maybe that was a resolution he could keep. Tentatively, he smiled, and leaned over so that his lips were close to his friend's ear, who was still staring, frightened, at the floor.

"So do I," he whispered.

Ethan raised his head slowly, unbelieving, to come face to face with Benny. For a long moment, they looked into each other's eyes, separated only by the length of their noses.

Ethan opened his mouth to say something.

Benny softly closed it again with his own.

Well, I think that's been long enough coming...

This is the end of 'Ice Cool Whitechapel', and I hope that you liked it. Hopefully, if I can think of thirteen new plots, there will be a second series - so keep an eye out for it! (End shameless plug...)

Anyway, thank you all for reading it (and sticking with it for so long), special thanks to those who left reviews (there's still time to join that exclusive group, by the way...), and I'll see you around!