Welcome to Gaia! ::

Clerise had, after much deliberation, decided to opt in for another External Mission.

The last one may have been utterly disastrous, but it was better than sitting at home (it was sad, really, how fast her dorm room had become that) and waiting for the world to end.

Metaphorically speaking, that is.

She waited by the portal, texting the others that had also volunteered for the mission. Clerise ignored the fact that the only reason that she was a little early was because she hadn't gotten back to sleep after her latest nightmare.

Rep dimly registered the beeping of his phone.

It took him a while before he actually moved to pick it up, giving it the bleariest look. He hadn't been sleeping, he'd just been lying in the dark, waiting like some kind of creature for when he could go to the gym and train. He was maybe expecting some kind of notice that something or other was out of commission. Like the toilets or something, given the facilities track record of utilities so far.

His stomach sunk as he realised one of the missions he'd put through for before the failed mission looked like it had come through. Fantastic. And he had a reminder text, he couldn't even say he'd missed it.

He didn't even bother brushing his hair, just threw on his clothes and dragged himself to the portal giving Clerise a frazzled look.

"Morning."

Clerise texted Marcus bcak with a fury in her fingers:


Her irritation was soothed by a certain raven-haired girl wandering in.

"You're a sight for sore eyes," Clerise murmured into Sasha's hair, kissing her temple sweetly, glad to have her presence. Even if it did mean she was going to be rather distressed if...anything happened.

On second thought, it was a terrible idea that Sasha was coming along. "Just couldn't sleep, don't worry your pretty little head about me--"

Rep wandered in like a zombie. "Morning, sunshine," she said with a laugh, pulling away to just have her arm slung around Sasha's shoulder. "I think we need to get some ******** caffeine the moment we get there."

She raised her hand to wave at Marcus. "Ugh. I don't have any, soo..." Clerise looked at them all--

and went through the portal.


TO SPAIN.

He could not have looked more depressed as Marcus arrived. Things never ended well with the other guy around, and he was too tired to even pretend to be friendly, shooting him a bleary glare. Who the hell had the time to eat before a mission? Clearly someone who wasn't him and didn't value sleep as much as he did. Or as the case was of late, ceiling staring time.

Sasha got a small share of the Marcus glare until he realised it was like glaring at a puppy and a waste of effort and gave her a smarmy smirk instead.

But he didn't say anything to anyone before wandering into the portal, on the other side stating.

"Right. Where the ******** are we this time?"

Clerise cackled with glee as they hit the streets of Spain, stars in her eyes. She conveniently overlooked the fact that Rep didn't get along with anyone save for her (and that was rocky at best, in an alliance partially forged from the mutual experience of trauma), and gave the team a wicked glance.

Except for Sasha, who just got calloused fingers slipping into dainty ones as Clerise observed their surroundings...Of course it would be dark, with the park already closed.

"There goes the coffee idea," Clerise muttered with legitimate depression in her voice-- and then froze when Marcus told her she was in charge. The last time a trainee had been in charge on a mission...

Things had happened. Rather unfortunate things she was not looking to reproduce.

"Well." Clerise glanced at Marcus, who was obviously still all kinds of out of sorts from his engagements from the night before-- after all, she knew a hickey when she saw one. Rep, on the other hand, looked about as bad as she knew she did-- and it hit her how amazing and a little terrifying it was that Sasha, of all people, was probably in the best state of mind out of the whole group.

God save them.

Okay, Clerise Nicole. Time to put your big girl panties on and...Not lead the team to a horrible fate. Totally easy. No big deal. Not even any big thing--

"All you ******** get to follow me, then, and there won't be any damn bitching about it. I want to follow the park along its left side, make a full circle. After that, we can hit anything in the middle we may have missed."

That was easy enough. Clerise released Sasha's hand from her own, looking around for a sign of what they'd encounter first. Even on the first one letting the group know that they were wandering through Mediterrània, there was a familiar spiral carved into it.

Clerise, having seen this symbol on both of her prior external missions, took the chance to snap a photo of it with her phone. "These ******** symbols again? Christ."

While the environment was completely different from the theme park she'd been to previously, it was pretty obvious that this was indeed a theme park. It was the second time Sasha had been to a theme park. It was just as creepy this time as it had been last time, especially since it was dark.

And they had snuck into it. It was also after hours. Sasha was very observant.

So when Clerise mentioned the symbol on the sign, Sasha gave the woman a worried look. "What does it mean? I didn't see any at the last mission I went on." Sasha looked apologetic but didn't deign it necessary to mention that this was only the second mission she'd been a part of.

When Rep seemed to trip, Sasha's worried look transferred to him.

"Are you okay?"

She would show them, the rest of her clan. The title of outcast stung more than a quick, swift death, the fact that her Queen had elected this title on her even more so.

Outcast, thrown away, discarded, for a simple matter alone: because she had disobeyed. But despite her protests, despite her insistence that she could still fight, they no longer wanted her. They used her and threw her away.

No, no no no. This was not over yet. She would still fight, she could still fight, she was from the Clan of War, and she would prove her worth back to them. Tear. Rip. Shred.

Kill.

At first her new home, her new hunting grounds was easy pickings: mere humans locked in a moment of pure terror as she descended upon them. Then, she smelled it, the sense of something else, another creature of Fear. The new presence had made her angry, someone else going after her prey, prey that she had painstakingly fought to find. No, no no, it was hers.

The spectre did not even stand a chance as she descended upon it, a mere flicker of broken feathers and tattered red cloth. They didn't dissipate, oh no, that would be too easy, she weakened them first, let their Fear begin to lose form, lose the ability to stabilize-

- And then went in for the kill.

Some would claim it was about the Fear. Harvesting the Fear, becoming stronger through Fear, being one as a colony. They were stupid, they were blind. It wasn't about Fear, it was about breaking breaking new toys. It was about being stronger, better, than everyone else. It was about hunting, stalking, chasing them until they yielded.

It was about the moment when they looked into her eyes and lost all semblance of hope. She licked her lips, dirtied wing feathers rustling, for a second, betraying her presence to any who had entered her hunting grounds. There were some new intruders here, oh she could feel them, sense them, taste them, taste that moment, but she would wait. She wanted to see which one was the greatest fighter.

And she would break their spirit first.