[[ Prompt One ]]
Once, Atropos might have spread the feathers of her wings out of nerves, shifted her weight from foot to foot. This time, she merely stood with her head to one side, and scanned the horizon slowly: heartless landscape, bloodless buildings, the hint of gutless denizens. Nothing like she nor her people. Atropos could, if she closed her eyes, still see the tree in which she lived: old branches reaching up, tangling around the roof of her hut, the sweet and heavy leaves that grew over her home. At times, their waxy surfaces reminded her of pelts from one of her many kills, once she had treated them to use them.
Although she may have fallen into these habits once, she was being tested for a reason. Atropos was eager to prove that she was ready. She was not channeling War, she was not fighting on behalf of War, she was the embodiment of her clan. Silently, she waited. The humans could not see her, but she caught some of them looking back at her, knowing. Useless, worthless, wastes of organic matter: but she one
One day, she would punish them for their weaknesses. She would feast upon their Fear wholesale. For now, she saw her clan member watching her, and waved back at them. Time to start.
She did love to fly, loved to spread her wings, but in this particular case... Atropos felt it would be better to walk around on foot first, looking for the task. Although she could get an excellent aerial view of the area, she thought that whatever she needed to see would be on the ground level: all the features of the buildings appeared to be visible only from the ground, and from the sky she suspected everything would just become a blanket of drab, soulless mess. This would not take long. On foot or by wing, Atropos' movement was fluid. Her feathers brushed against her curls and the jaw shifted against her shoulders with every step, knocking bone against bone.
[[ Prompt Two ]]
The town was small, and it really wasn't hard to tell what her target was: two stores, both advertising similar items. Clothing, to be specific. The one on the left looked like it had far less to offer, and like it probably was not as powerful as the other. Whatever human grouping ran the one on the right clearly held the power sway in the area; it was much larger, cleaner and it seemed to garner more interest and attention. Because that larger store seemed like the ultimate goal, Atropos approached the smaller one next to it instead. Its door was barred, which might not be a problem if she put some effort into it, but instead of trying she walked all the way around the building to survey it. Her examination betrayed the wooden, easy door in the back. What kind of tribe would be stupid enough to guard the front, but not the rear? She reached out one hand to jiggle the handle, but to no avail. It was locked. Atropos' light eyes narrowed, as she reached up into her hair adornments and plucked a couple metal wires free. She used them to adjust the tumbler of the lock, jiggling until the shamefully easy lock popped open.
A door, when broken, was of no more use to her. A door which she had opened without breaking could later be shut, used to create a stronghold, any number of things. It was much more useful than a bunch of hanging splinters, and she would much rather not shut any options off to herself. What was not needed at the time may be needed later. They may have locked it, but they certainly hadn't guarded it very well. Not that it would have stopped Atropos even if it had.
She whistled to herself under her breath as she worked on the lock, and as soon as the lock yielded, she started to add the words to her song. It was common that on the battlefield, singing rallied purpose and directed force. Not sweet songs, often simple rhythmic ones. Sometimes when she was younger, the women had taught her songs in order to help her remember how the world worked. She started to sing one now, standing up and preparing to open the door, not bothering with the dirt that had caked on the soles of her feet as she entered. "First you take away its life, then grab it by the tail, scrape it with your knife," she sang to herself, under her breath. She was about to open the door and step inside, when it swung open in front of her, as if moved by an invisible power.
[[ Prompt Three ]]
Not quite invisible power. It turned out that a human had opened the door, sensing her presence as some of them did. She didn't think twice, pause or hesitate. Atropos didn't even stop singing. "Slice it by the belly, slit it head to toe, slice it by the belly, this is what I know," she continued to sing, in her even and rhythmic voice, as she forcefully elbowed the human into the room. She crushed its windpipe with one swipe of her gauntlet-clad forearm, feathers rustling from the movement. She shut the door behind her with her spare hand, and slipped her precious knife out of the space in her sash nestled against the hollow of her back. "Guts spill out, bloody hands; rip them out, wash the blood away," she continued to sing, evenly, keeping her breathing calm. With one deft movement, she sliced the knife across the human's throat and then held the body to her as she stabbed it in the stomach, twisted, and carved a diagonal slice to disembowel them. As the life bubbled out of them, Atropos smelled the copper thickness of blood settle across the room. She stopped singing for a moment to c**k her head at the body, before wiping her knife clean on its shirt, lovingly clean, and then dragging the body out of the way. She didn't particularly care enough to hide it, but she didn't want to trip on it later.
As she propped it up against one of the walls, she looked at it and said, "If I take your life, I take it with my own hands. I am the one who is responsible." After all, the thread of life was so fine. Whenever she fought an opponent, it was as if she could feel their thread in her hands, and she could feel the places to slice in order to cut that thread. The neck, the stomach, the tendons, the arteries-- everything was so temporary. So easy to end. And she felt no remorse for killing a human-- how could she? They were made to serve, to suffer, and to fear her kind.
[[ Prompt Four ]]
The inside of the building was built in a way differently from her own hut, not that she was unfamiliar with the concept: the polished wood mirrored certain buildings in her clan, just not where she lived. Her calloused feet padded across the smooth wood tentatively, as she was unused to so much of it, however. She stooped down for a moment and touched the floor with her fingertips, wondering how much the texture would affect combat. It was important for her to know her surroundings, in any situation. Atropos, in straightening, became tangled in some kind of smooth scarf. In irritation, she pulled it off and let it fall. The material was soft, unlike anything she would wear. Who would want clothing so fragile? It would never hold up at all in her usual situation. Leather, bone, metal, fur-- Atropos took what she needed and they fashioned clothes they could fight in. They did not dress in overly complicated manners; as little as they needed to remain comfortable, without the hindrance of fashion or clothing in their combat. That was how it had to be done.
So any of this would be absolutely useless to her. Ultimately, this was not her destination, and she knew that now. Investigating had been necessary, but now it was time to leave. No time to linger and waste her precious resources. Irritated, Atropos left the way she'd come, waving goodbye to the body. In battle, she might honour the slain, particularly their own fighters. Here, the corpse had no value to her. It was true that keeping them alive to harvest Fear from them could be far more useful, but... How would the humans understand to be afraid if they did not waste a few of them on their way?
As she stepped out of the building, she began to sing the song again, using it to keep time and measure how long it was taking her to complete the task. Interrupting it meant she would have to gauge inaccurately how long she had been in the shop, but this time she would make an effort to time herself accurately. Without looking back at the body she'd left, Atropos continued on to the next line of the instructional song, "Slice away the fins, because it can't swim, slice them up and do away with them."
[[ Prompt Five ]]
Atropos paused as the large windows at the front of the store slid open and a couple humans exited through them. It wasn't the doors' motion itself that was so unpleasant, but rather the weird sound it made when it opened. It made her spine crawl. When she entered the building, it was blindingly bright, and yet sunless-- the sensation of being so exposed made her deeply uncomfortable. Atropos crept over to one of the walls, flattened her back against it and watched as the shoppers filtered out of the area slowly. All the while, she was humming the song and tapping her foot. She had started it over again after reaching the end, so she could carry on roughly from where she had been singing the words aloud. It was enough to keep them in her head, at least, to measure her efforts.
The clothing in this store was, in part, similar to that which she'd found in the smaller building. However, she didn't really know what to make of some of it: it seemed far richer. The other clans, probably all of them, would have more of a use for these garments than she did. It was a useless burden, to take any of them, just like it had been earlier. The only thing they would be good for would be soaking them in fuel and setting fire to them to make a torch or a burning barricade. At the moment, that was not what she needed; it was already blindingly brilliant in here.
With single-minded purpose, Atropos proceeded to her target: the chiefs of this large building, and potentially the tribe's chiefs, given the luxury of some of the goods in this building and the way in which the humans seemed to fawn over them. Surely, the chieftains of this tribe must be hiding in that small room... Atropos proceeded towards it.
[[ Prompt Six ]]
Once she was alone, she started to sing the verses aloud again. Hearing the words made her feel like she was in her own territory, and not amidst the humans. It was an idle habit. "First you take away its life, then grab it by the tail, scrape it with your knife. Slice it by the belly, slit it head to toe, slice it by the belly, this is what I know," as she walked, she took the knife out of its resting place at the small of her back, and traced its talon-sharp point along the walls next to her. They would certainly never dull her blade, and even if they did, she had sharpening tools on her. A dull knife meant a dull mind, and a dull mind meant defeat in combat. She would never allow that to happen. It would be a disgrace.
As she opened the door to the small room, she was right: the chieftains sat around the table. Or that was who she assumed sat there, at any rate. She stared at them, observing, her head tilted for a moment. They had looked towards her when she entered, but she suspected that if she were to wait a moment, they would look away again; they could not actually see her, if experience had told her anything. As soon as they began to talk again, Atropos strode towards them, rocking as she moved, keeping time to the music in her head. She leaned down between the two of them, one of her trinkets falling over their shoulder, and she looked back and forth between the two faces, before looking towards the man who sat at the desk. "I'll be," she said as she faced one man's cheek, "the one," she added, as she looked at the second, "to cut your threads," she finished, pointing her knife idly at the man sitting behind the desk. Stepping back a bit, she tipped the one on the left over in his chair, and her foot quickly fell to his windpipe, crushing it.
Before the second man, sitting beside him previously, could rise, Atropos bent down and sliced the tendons of both ankles, leaving him useless. She suffocated the man under her foot as she slit the throat of the screaming one on the right. Then, all that was left was the man behind the desk. "Cut off the head with a knife, cut its head off with a knife. That's why we keep our knives sharp, that's why we keep our knives bright," she mumbled, still keeping time, every step and incision to the warlike beat of the song. She jumped up on the desk, the terrified chieftain who remained backing away without really understanding what it is he had to fear. Finally, he tripped over himself. Atropos glided lightly off the desk, her wings opening just enough to allow for a graceful, swift motion, and she dug her knife into his belly, slitting it open like one would gut a fish.
Appropriate, given the song she had been singing was one taught to young women who had to learn how to clean, gut and prepare their catches. Atropos reached into his entrails and ripped out whatever she found, just like she would if she was cleaning a fish out. "--that's why we keep our knives bright.
So we can take away a life," she finished the instructional song. She would have to sing it just one more time, probably, before leaving the place... but her task appeared to be mostly accomplished.
[[ Prompt Seven ]]
While she was preparing to leave the bodies there, she noticed a bright metal object tipping out of the last chieftain's pocket: picking it up, and examining it, her hands slick with blood, she saw the hinge and wondered what it might be. Curious fingers opened it while she headed out of the room, hopping up on displays occasionally to glide part of the way.
Once open, she realized it had flint, and a wick, and... hm. Perhaps if she struck this... and it did, in fact, yield fire. With a happy smile, Atropos touched the live flame to garments wherever she walked, letting the flames consume the expensive fabric. May as well burn the place to the ground-- she was done, now. Nothing to preserve, protect or conserve for her own stealth's sake. Her goal had been achieved. Now it was only a matter of leaving the building, and receiving her examination results. Atropos, remembering how crucial it was to care for her weapon, grabbed one of the rather nice scarves briefly in order to clean her knife off and put it back in its resting place, the sheath held in her sash at the small of her back.
[[OOC: In case you are wondering, the ridiculous fish-gutting lyrics are just something I put together for this purpose >>; So here was the whole awful song xD ::
First you take away its life, then grab it by the tail, scrape it with your knife.
Slice it by the belly, slit it head to toe, slice it by the belly, this is what I know.
Guts spill out, bloody hands, rip them out and wash it clean.
Slice away the fins, because it can't swim, slice them up and do away with them.
Cut off the head with a knife, cut its head off with a knife.
That's why we keep our knives sharp, that's why we keep our knives bright.
So we can take away a life.
Your Gaia Name: Face Your Demons
Your Minis Name: Faceyourdemons
Choice 1: Explore the town on foot, looking for the task.
Choice 2: Pick the lock.
Choice 3: Kill him.
Choice 4: Choose to do nothing. Leave the store as it is.
Choice 5: Do nothing; go straight to where you the chieftains would be.
Choice 6: Attack and kill them all.
Choice 7: Set multiple fires to the place.
I, FACE YOUR DEMONS, FULLY UNDERSTAND THAT IF I WIN AND FAIL TO POST AN ENROLLMENT FORM WITHIN [NUMBER] DAYS THAT MY PRIZE WILL BE REVOKED.
I ALSO UNDERSTAND THAT IT IS MY RESPONSIBILITY TO CHECK IN FOR THE FINAL PROMPT AFTER [END DATE HERE].
