Welcome to Gaia! ::

A few days after being attacked by the cat monster, Fleur was at the animal shelter feeding the things. Well, maybe not monsters, but certainly cats. The thing was, though, she couldn't really tell. She had looked them all over for anything unnatural, and she hadn't found anything, but she wasn't convinced. The monster had seemed fine at first, after all. Fleur was officially freaked. At least the day was almost over. She could have swore they were watching her more than normal. She wasn't being paranoid, though. She was being wary.

"Hey Fleur, I think we've got it covered for now, ok?" A shelter employee told her. She nodded, grabbed her stuff, signed out and left the room of possible monsters. The receptionist gave her a worried look on the way out. Had she really been that obvious? Maybe she was overreacting a bit. At least she didn't have to worry about it for a while. Fleur found a nice park bench and unpacked her supper. Just some tuna salad, carrot sticks, a candy bar and a soda, but she had places to be. Luckily, places without cats to freak out about. She looked up at the beginning of the sunset, and she finally felt safe and relaxed.

She was actually enjoying her sandwich. It was nice just sitting there, doing nothing for a little. Then there was another one. A cat. Fleur smiled sweetly at it. She was freaked, of course, but it was probably just a coincidence. Then, while looking for anything unnatural, she saw the star on the cat's head. Fleur barely stifled a scream. Instead, she gasped loudly, but she didn't run. That was common sense. Run from the predator, and it will chase you. She smiled, but it was fake now, a distraction. The cat's eyes were screaming hungry. Terrified, she packed her meal up quickly except for her sandwich.

"Hey, kitty-" she tried to croon. Her voice wasn't soft, but at least she didn't sound totally freaked. "You want this? Here." She threw the sandwich, not with all her strength but so it landed a little bit behind the cat. "Please... have that, don't eat me. Please. Leave. Me. Alone." Her voice cracked at the end, and she was practically crying... Fleur wasn't firm, she was obviously terrified, but she was alone with a monster cat, it wasn't like anyone would care. "Please." She was full-on crying now, this time nobody was appearing to protect her. She should have listened to the news and done... something... But it was too late for that, too late for anything. She walked away briskly, then broke into a run. Nothing mattered now.

It didn't take long for Fleur to tire as athletics, especially running, had never been her thing. So she was already gasping a little when she heard the chime of a small bell behind her. Of course, it didn't help that she was terrified. Glancing behind her, she saw, of course, the cat. She screamed. Not exactly a long, bloodcurdling horror movie scream, but it was definitely a scream. The monster had a nice little disguise, fluffy and lovable, even with the cute bell collar and head star, which weren't scary. But normal cats didn't chase people over tuna sandwiches. Ever. She was noticing things that she hadn't thought of before, like the color of the sky. Her brain was screaming you are going to die at her. So she gave up. She had known the running was stupid, so she curled in a ball and waited for the monster to arrive.

Fleur shuddered a bit as the thing approached. It leaned forwards... But instead of fangs, she felt the softness of a cat's nose on her ankle. Usually, it was something she loved, but by now she had stopped seeing the cat as anything but a monster. She looked at it. " Come on, just eat me already." The cat's eyes were huge. They seemed to be slipping into her soul. It was an adorable cat, but that didn't matter. Fleur was about to die. She really didn't care about her killer's appearance. "I already know you're a monster..."

She shrugged. Talking to animals had always been one of Fleur's habits. But she realized that just because this cat was magical didn't mean it could understand her."Well, you're a cat, too, I guess. You guys always play with your mice... Just my luck. I guess being saved twice is too much to ask." Was the cat actually listening to her? She couldn't tell. She wouldn't give it the satisfaction of seeing her terrified any more, though. She was an actress, after all. Instead, she looked up at the wonderful sunset, though she barely saw it.

Then, the cat talked. The cat. It talked. Fleur, having never seen a talking cat before, and in fact having had the fact that animals don't talk ground into her head from an early age, did the only logical thing and gasped. Loudly. She still didn't know whether or not to believe the cat, but it didn't have the wicked red eyes of the monster, and the monster didn't have the star. But the cat still had some explaining to do before Fleur would believe it.

After about thirty seconds of staring at the cat, *********, Fleur said, "You're kind of obviously not 'merely a cat.' I mean..." She counted the points off on her fingers, "Even if that star thing is your owner's idea of cute or something, cats don't talk. And I would probably know. I've talked to enough. They never talk back." The girl gave the cat a hard look and then glanced back towards the park bench, not so far away. She could see the outline of some birds. So much for giving away her sandwich... "The sandwich... you could have eaten it. I gave it to you, but you followed me instead. That's not what a typical cat would have done. If you'd eaten it instead of chasing me, I wouldn't have thought you were a monster..." Hoping her points were made clearly to *********, Fleur sighed, partly relieved and partly still afraid that the fluffball would become a fanged horror.

So ok, maybe ********* wasn't a monster, but maybe she was, Fleur was still a bit wary. Either way, she was a little snobbish and extremely cryptic. Other cats never having anything to say... that sounded like a dumb excuse, like 'I told you so' only not. Fleur decided not to bring it up, though. Then the stuff about the sandwich and monsters... ********* still hadn't said anything that made much sense. And back to how she was more important than the sandwich. So Fleur stared at the cat, her eyes narrowed a little in annoyance. This cat was wasting her time. Even if it was a monster, it could at least eat her now.

"My name is Fleur Willis." She saw no reason to lie. "And of course I'm scared of you! It's not like you can prove you're not a monster." Fleur's tone, however dared the cat to do just that. Then, she sighed. "This cat I saw not far from here a few days ago... This girl in weird clothes told me to get away from it, so I did. Then it turned into a monster, you know red eyes and fangs and stuff. If it weren't for her I'd be dead..." Fleur left out the details of her experience, but she shuddered anyway. "And if you're not a monster, why am I so much more important than the sandwich? You're not a normal cat, either, so what are you?"

So now ********* was finally giving her answers... Cryptic answers, of course, to questions Fleur hadn't asked, but hey... it was better than before. She gasped again as the cat flipped. "Normal cats can totally backflip," Fleur accused. Her voice was slightly exasperated but also held a hint of sarcasm. A smile flashed briefly across her face. "The Negaverse, huh? Is that where all the crazy stuff's from? A parallel universe?" She gave the cat a questioning look. "Are the senshi from there too, or just the um... youma?" She played uncertainly with the new words.

"My name's ok, I guess." Fleur murmured, quickly changing the subject back to something she understood. "People say it's unique a lot... It's never on those little Christmas ornaments so I guess it is." Her gaze turned to the objects the cat had showed her. "Oh, I dropped my stuff?" She picked up the phone first, turning it over carefully. It looked a little older than hers, and was a different color. She realized the other object was a pen, with an ornament on top. It was pretty, a ring surrounding a circle with a bow and arrow on it. Fleur looked back to the cat. "No, these aren't mine. I have my phone here, and I've never had anything like this before. It's beautiful. I would have remembered. They must be somebody else's. But who would have dropped such nice things, and in the same place?"

"Oh, you meant you're giving these to me?" Fleur looked at them again. What would she do with them? "Than you very much," She replied out of habit. This time, when the ********* came up she stroked her ears gently, though she was still a bit wary. Fleur eyed her new pen with much more suspicion than the cat. She decided that denying the cat's request would just make things more complicated. Setting her phone down, she held the pen up. She was an actress. Saying things with expression was what she was best at. She spoke slowly. "Cybele..." What was that, anyway? "Power..." Something felt weird. Something weird was about to happen. "Make up!" There was a half-second of terrifying stillness.

Suddenly, everything was very bright. Green and silver swirled around her, and she could feel new fabric swish against her skin. Within a few seconds, though, the light faded. It was the same empty street, the same talking cat... Only she had changed. The girl could still see the tips of Fleur's pale green pigtails. She was still the same person, though she felt stronger... And more confused. Her mind gave her some answers. "So Cybele... Is me?" Cybele blinked and looked down at herself. She was wearing sandals with tall laces, and there seemed to be flowers in her hair. Her dress was simple, flowy and white. "Why am I wearing a toga?" She demanded of *********, thinking it was the best way to sum up her situation. She felt something cool on her head and found she was wearing a tiara in the shape of silver laurels. Not that it really mattered on top of everything else, but it made Cybele frown. "I'm a princess or something?" she murmured to herself. She glanced back to *********, suddenly accusing. "You said this wouldn't turn me into anything!"