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Posted: Sun Feb 05, 2012 1:14 pm
It was mid-afternoon by the time Arian reluctantly tucked the book he was reading neatly back on the correct shelf and even more reluctantly left the warmth of the library for the winter chill of the outside.
Making a stop off at the bakery down the road, the dark-haired teen picked up a few triple chocolate cookies and a large hot chocolate before heading two streets down from the library to the road that lead to an alleyway.
A few moments to make sure he was alone, a calling out of a certain phrase and it was Sailor Athene who paused to slip on the coat and pick up the hot chocolate from the wall that it had been left to rest on. It wasn’t as if he had to be home anytime soon and Athene figured that it wouldn’t hurt to do a bit of patrolling before heading back. If he was lucky it would be quiet and if not – well it wouldn’t be the first hot drink that the dark-haired senshi had ended up having to dump.
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Posted: Sat Feb 18, 2012 4:22 am
Gigi trailed along the street, too wrapped up in her own thoughts to notice any other people around her, even familiar ones. At the tail end of a long string of errands, her arms were laden with shopping bags - some groceries, some school books, and a cardboard cup of coffee, still steaming.
Loyalty, she thought, was a wonderful thing, particularly when you were flat broke and freezing. The stuff her mum had wanted cost more than expected, and she'd had a horrible moment of thinking she wouldn't be able to afford a hot drink for the walk home. But she'd been lucky - one of the half-a-dozen loyalty cards crammed in her purse had enough stamps to earn her a free regular coffee. She'd pretty much run across town to claim it. The last pathetic silver coins in her purse upgraded it to a large, and suddenly the afternoon was looking much brighter.
The next stop was home, she decided, to get all the homework out of the way. Sipping her drink, she was already rehearsing maths problems in her head, barely watching where she was going, let alone paying attention to the alleyways that peeled off into darkness nearby.
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Posted: Sun Feb 19, 2012 7:03 am
It was not a good idea to wander around Destiny City distracted at the best of times and most certainly not in the evenings – quite often there were things lurking in the shadows that crept out to play once the sun had set for the day… Things that were not necessarily conducive to the health of your average citizen if the news reportage covering the aftermath of certain ‘mishaps’ were anything to go on. It was one of these things that lingered in one of the alleyways that the curly-haired girl passed, its many feet clicking on the sidewalk as, after a few minutes pause, it set off after the brown-haired teen, the light cast by the odd street light glinting off a long stinger.
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Posted: Thu Feb 23, 2012 3:47 am
The sound was innocuous at first, an uneven clicking that barely impinged on the girl's thoughts. Gigi continued the long walk home, bags swinging, oblivious to the gaping alley mouths along the way, and all the horrors they held. Yes, Destiny City was a dangerous place, everyone knew that - but outside of the occasional nightmare, it didn't apply to her. It was a thing that happened to other people, like winning the lottery or getting on TV. She was much too busy to worry about terrorist attacks and monsters. The eerie noise only registered at all because of its lack of rhythm, a dissonance against the quick even clop of her boot heels on the pavement, jarring against the numbers she was trying to keep straight in her head. Maths without paper was too hard, she concluded. Especially with someone tap-tap-tapping right behind her. What was that, anyway? Did someone have a broken bike wheel or something?
She kept walking, a little faster. Now that she'd noticed it properly, it was all she heard.
Or a clicky pen? Some little dweeb was following her home with a clicky pen to see how long it'd take for her to crack. She gritted her teeth and kept walking, though the little noise was grating now. More than one pen? Army of dweebs?
Taking a deep breath, the girl stuck a hand on her hip and turned around sharply, ready to deliver a lecture to the noisy offender. The only sound that came out was a shrill little scream. Green. Snakey. Caterpillary. Army of legs. Oh god giant stinger.
In a tumble of scattered bags and spilled latte, Gigi tried to run.
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Posted: Sat Feb 25, 2012 5:32 am
It was shaping up to be a relatively uneventful patrol and Athene alternated between drinking the hot chocolate and using the cup as an alternative hand warmer as he wandered along the street and wished – not for the first time – that his outfit had seen fit to come with gloves. Little did the dark-haired senshi know that it was a quiet that was not going to last as he debated perhaps maybe heading home for the evening. That is until he passed the entrance to the alleys that ran behind some of the shops and picked up on the aura that he had come to associate with a youma being somewhere around in the near vicinity. The scream rang out when he was about three quarters of the way down the alley, the shrill sound coming from not very far up and Athene found himself covering the rest of the distance at a fast trot. It was the youma that the dark-haired senshi noticed first as he rounded the corner, hard not to really – not when it looked like someone had partnered a giant caterpillar with a snake and the large dog-sized monstrosity was the out of wedlock result. From where the dark-haired senshi was standing behind it, he could see the thing had reared up with its tail pointing at something in front, although he couldn’t see what or who.
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Posted: Sun Feb 26, 2012 4:06 am
The thing had too many legs, and Gigi only had two, and even ditching the groceries wasn't helping her gain any ground - in fact, the shopping littering the pavement was hindering her more than it. She stumbled over the fallen bags, an ungraceful retreat, listening to the clickety centipede feet in counterpoint to her own shaky breathing. How close was it now?
She risked a look back, which was a horror movie mistake, and she berated herself for not knowing better - it was not only far too close, but getting ready to strike, the sting catching the light.
The civilian let out another desperate scream, this one as loud and long as she could. If this was going to be her last breath, someone had better hear it.
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Posted: Sun Feb 26, 2012 7:08 am
Oh god that thing’s got someone trapped back there! The thought ran through Athene’s mind as another shrill scream rang out from in front. Despite the last time he’d attempted to help out not going so well, the dark-haired senshi couldn’t well leave whoever it was out there to the most likely not so tender mercies of the youma. But he needed something to try and distract the thing’s attention and fast.
As he glanced around for something to maybe chuck at the youma, Athene’s gaze landed on the up-to-now forgotten polystyrene cup that was still about half full of chocolate that he was still holding clenched in his hand. He’d meant to chuck it away, but now it would serve another purpose – potential distraction aid.
The cup splattered against the side of the youma, liquid chocolate dripping down its side, although it hadn’t seemed to do much as a distraction aid. A piece of one of the bits of rubble littering the alley, had better results the tail swinging to side as the youma half-turned to face the pest behind.
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Posted: Mon Feb 27, 2012 5:11 am
She was still breathing. Not calmly, by any stretch, but the thing hadn't struck yet. She had time realise she couldn't outrun it, to look up into the monstrous eyes, see the stinger begin to move. And then it turned away.
There was someone else there. Someone had come! And was throwing things!
And the smart thing, the sensible thing, would be to get while the getting was good, but somehow she couldn't persuade her body to move again, like the thing had used some kind of freeze spell on her. Or Paralyze, or some other funky card game mechanic, she didn't even know. She was so *tapped*.
The thoughts swirling in her head didn't seem to want to connect. She should throw something too. There were, like, tomato tins and stuff. But that would require motor control. She needed to turn around and run some more. Was there anywhere to run? What if the monster ate the other person? What if it ate them both? With jerky movements, Gigi stumbled her way towards the nearest wall - for support, to be out of the way, she didn't know. She didn't want to leave while the monster ate someone else instead of her.
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Posted: Mon Feb 27, 2012 2:47 pm
Look like I’ve succeeded in getting its attention Athene thought, part of him half wishing that he hadn’t as he suddenly became the focus of baleful staring eyes. There was a stinger attached to the youma’s tail – a giant stinger – a stinger that the dark-haired senshi was trying hard not to stare too hard at.
Biting back a gulp, Athene reached down, trying not to let the youma out of his sight as he tried to pick up another piece of rubble – he needed to keep the thing’s attention away from the brief movement that he’d thought he’d seen from out of the corner of his eyes, try to give whoever was out there a chance to run.
Athene was partially successful, the dark-haired senshi having to abandon grabbing the potential projectile in favour of awkwardly flinging himself away from the faster than expected tail lashing out in his direction. Still at least the thing’s attention was no longer on its earlier victim – at least not for the moment. Now all he had to do was keep it that way.
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Posted: Mon Feb 27, 2012 10:44 pm
Castille wasn't exactly looking forward to spring, but a warm up in the weather would be nice.
She shivered and pulled her jacket tighter, trying to walk faster to warm up. All she had to do was get to the bus stop, and then it would be a nice ride almost to her house. Her hands went to her exposed ears, and she muttered something about getting a new hairstyle. In the summer the double buns kept the hair off her neck which kept her cool, but in the winter they made her ears freeze off. Through her fingers she heard a shout, and the girl stopped dead in her tracks. Shouting was never good. She skimmed in front of a crowd of people, leaning against a wall and trying to look around without being suspicious. Maybe it was nothing. But just in case...
The space behind a dumpster was room enough for her to transform. Eternal Sailor Grus stepped out and went up, climbing a fire ladder until she reached the top of a building. There was a quiet ping! of a youma, and a stronger feeling of a senshi. She honed in on the signals, running quickly to gaze down at the alley between a coffee shop and the bakery.
There was a giant.....thing type youma cornering a girl. From above, Grus couldn't tell just what it was supposed to look like, but it sure was gross from her vantage point. The senshi signal she felt was behind it. She watched the youma change its target to the senshi, and she took the opportunity of distraction to leap down from the roof, landing with knees bent and a palm open on the ground to steady herself.
"Hey!" She shouted, kicking a large-ish looking rock at the youma. "I don't know who made you, but they need lessons! Bring your ugly mug this way!" Confuse it. Good move.
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Posted: Tue Feb 28, 2012 9:14 am
There was a youma out and about. It had interrupted her meal time which was being spent picking through a nearby dumpster of the various bits of wasted food. Even though her stomach protested with a kitty sized gurgle, ********* tried to ignore the tummy complaints for now. She could stuff herself later. Right now was business time!
Before she had even come into view, the faint sound of her collar jingling rather quickly was clue enough that she was approaching. However, soon enough she had zipped up along the side that a familiar senshi was at.
"...Oooo... Athene... that's a pretty strong youma you have in front of you there..." the feline commented in a less than helpful manner. Even in danger, she still somewhat sounded like this was all a game.
Of course, Sailor Athene was not a still target, having to dodge the youma's lashing out. In a slightly more helpful manner, she called out to him "...Give me your henshin pen... hurry hurry hurry!"
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Posted: Sun Mar 04, 2012 3:16 am
Back pressed to the wall, Gigi tried to get a glimpse of her rescuer while the monstrosity was distracted. She wanted to see who it was, and more importantly, if they were all right. All she saw was flashes of white on the far side of the horrible wall of legs. It was easier to focus on the person than the monster in the way.
Another little startled squeak rose in her throat as it seemed a huge bloodied bird was falling nearby, but she stifled the sound with her hands as the figure resolved into a girl in a red feathered dress. It was a terrorist, she was sure. Terrorists were fighting the monster. There was a little bit of her brain that thought this was soo cool. And another little bit was still filtering the whole thing through CCG rules, where a snakipede monster was so much more cope-with-able than it was in a dark alley in real life. But mostly she was just very much hoping that it wouldn't turn around again.
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Posted: Sun Mar 04, 2012 12:40 pm
The youma let out a loud hiss as the rock bounced off its side. It seemed it liked the rock about as much as it had liked the small piece of rubble that Athene had chucked at it earlier, the stinger-tipped tail moving threateningly from side to side as a snaky eye focused balefully on the senshi that had dropped into the scene with a flurry of white and red. Still at least it had stopped focusing on the curly-haired civilian.
It would have been hard to miss the other senshi’s aura, not with it so close and so much stronger than his own and as he picked himself up from the ground, Athene called out a warning to the newcomer “Watch out for the stinger on the tail of that thing, it looks horribly sharp.” He might have added more, but at that moment a familiar cat appeared at his side, bell jingling and jangling on the blue collar round her neck. And it was a ‘her’, their paths may have crossed only once before but Athene hadn’t forgotten the cat that had given him his henshin pen – and who now wanted it back for some reason. “Here it is *********.” Now didn’t really seem to be a good time to ask questions so despite his puzzlement the dark-haired senshi simply handed the golden over-sized pen-like object to the silvery-grey furred cat.
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Posted: Mon Mar 05, 2012 10:36 pm
Grus's eyes glanced quickly over to the other senshi, and she nodded in mute recognition. The stinger was threatening; it was amazing she had missed it before. She jumped away from it, moving in sharp actions to keep its attention.
"If you can, now would be a good time to run." She shouted to the civilian trapped in the corner. She felt a familiar aura, and smiled. So a cat has come to join the fight.
The tail whipped at her head, and she dodged behind a garbage can. A second strike put the stinger right through the apparently flimsy metal, and Grus rolled away from it, allowing the youma to take the garbage can with it. Refuse rained down as it angrily shook the stinger, trying to rid itself of the garbage can.
"Feather Fall Strike!" The cloud of feathers whipped around her, then whistled forward at her command. The snake-like head was lost in a feather cloud. It began to stomp, hissing loudly. Apparently paper cuts hurt a lot worse when they are on your face.
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Posted: Tue Mar 06, 2012 4:25 pm
********* did not have hands at the moment. It was a tragedy, since she couldn't just take the object handed to her in her own. It had to toppled to the ground after she nudged it out of Athene's palm.
Rather than demand the boy's attention for the moment, the feline set a paw on the henshin pen and closed her eyes to concentrate for a bit. The object itself started to glow, faintly at first, then brighter as she kept her eyes shut. It probably wasn't the best idea for a cat to have her eyes shut in a scenario with a strong youma about, however, it was necessary at the moment! Plus, with Sailor Grus nearby giving off the energy of an eternal senshi, it probably made the manx seem insignificant at the moment.
If this was a Pokemon game, one might have thought the pen was evolving, since it was glowing and soon enough began to change shape. Alas, Athene's pen did not evolve. It just changed. When the glowing had stopped, the pen looked quite different from what it had been before.
Pulling back her paw, the round animal opened her eyes, glancing towards Athene's direction. "...Henshin up again... call out 'Athene Asteroid Power, Make-up!'" After giving her instructions, she picked up the seemingly new object between her teeth and quickly approached the senshi to drop it off by his ankles.
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