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 Posted: Sat Oct 07, 2017 12:52 pm
Katie would, under normal circumstances, not describe herself as a 'runner'. She preferred the quick sprints on the court, or a brief jog between classes. The idea of just running for miles, thoughts to herself and nothing else to occupy her? It sounded boring, bland, and at least three other words that were short-hand for 'anti-fun'. But ever since she'd fallen through a mirror and seen those people in costumes, it made her wonder if that whole fever dream from the previous spring hadn't just been a dream after all, and that gave her plenty of thoughts to want to be alone for.
One of her teammates had recommended a series of trails on a nicer side of town, something to do to get out and see nature while working on those #gains. Katie was already halfway to the trail when she'd gotten the text that her teammate had to make a rain-check, so she felt committed to the run even though she'd be going solo now. She parked near the main trail house, taking stock of the sounds of birds and nature as she tied the bright green laces of her shoes.
Out of curiosity, she checked her phone--the signal was s**t. Of course. But she could see people on the trail ahead, jogging or walking between the yellowing trees, so it was pretty clear that no one was actually dying from lack of access to their phones. Sighing, Katie tucked the device into the pocket of her hoodie and tied up her hair, still dreading the prospect of having to go five miles all by herself.
Perhaps it was a relief, then, when one of the trees began to rear up its branches and slam into the ground, causing a gaggle of screams from further in the trail. Katie nearly jumped out of her own skin in the scramble to get away, but something glimmering and white caught the edge of her attention, and with curiosity overpowering the sudden startle she turned back around to face the tree-beast.
On the ground in front of her was the star-clad ball, like it'd always been there, pointing the way between her and the youma. She hadn't seen it in months.
"O--okay, guess we're cool again," she stammered to no one in particular, kicking the ball up into her hand. The moment she felt her fingers coil around the sphere, her world exploded into light, and in the afterglow there was Chauvet Page, still definitely startled but feeling like starlight from her head to her much-less-sensible shoes.
"Hey Ugly!" she called to the tree-youma, waving her opera glove clad arms to get the thing's attention. It turned away from a group of boys and screeched at her, which was about the moment she realized that this monster was tree-sized, and had bark for teeth, and was incredibly pissed. In a streak of courage, she threw the baseball in her hand at the youma. It arced beautifully, thwacked against the side of the beast, and then rolled harmlessly away.
"s**t," she murmured, also to no one in particular.
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Posted: Sat Oct 07, 2017 1:54 pm
"OK that's probably not great..." Or at least, he assumed that shouts of 'Hey Ugly'... in conjunction with screaming and crashing... were... well... It was Destiny City. If it -actually- turned out to just be someone filming an amateur film he'd give up beer for a week. He paused in running, braced his hands on his knees for a moment to growl in fury, and then powered up, raising his eyebrows as he felt not only the trace of youma energy but... Well that explained the yell and attempt to distract... but he dashed in that direction anyway, muttering a string of curses under his breath. Lena was going to smack him. It was -just- supposed to be a run, though honestly... he didn't know why he was surprised anyway. Destiny City, your personal destination to be eaten by chaos monsters. "Hang on! I'm coming!" He called out, as he dashed toward the noises, skidding to a halt as he finally came up on the scene, only to see the looming tree monster. "Ohhhh Sh...." Well ********. Why couldn't he have an damn axe? He could REALLY use a damn axe. And the page was a Cosmos Knight... she was worse off than he was. "HEY so... Not gonna lie... this doesn't look like fun." s**t, what the hell was the plan? He was supposed to be getting better at plans. So far they were at 'Summon Asterion and try not to burn down the woods', and 'Hit it with everything he had available and try not to die." Lena wouldn't particularly approve of either option. "You don't happen to remember what the fire warning for today wasy?" He called from across the way, summoning his net to hand. "Because it would be good to know." But hey, in the mean time, he could keep it off the girl. He lunged forward and lashed at it with the weighted net, hoping that it would at least get it's attention. On the plus side... it was the size of a tree. Maybe it wouldn't be able to move as quickly. He hoped. Fast and huge would just be worse. It was probably going to be worse.
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Posted: Sat Oct 07, 2017 9:16 pm
Chauvet wasn't sure how, but she felt something change in the air, like watching a campfire burst to life when you added lighter fluid. Her eyes widened when, likewise, the Mars Knight burst through the underbrush, the corners of her mouth curling into a wide grin.
"Hey, I know you!" Chauvet piped up, running a wide arc around the tree demon to avoid one of its falling branches. "You were that guy at the thing--with the--the Code!" She skidded to a stop a few feet away from him, her skirts already carrying brambles and twigs from the underbrush. The youma was--thankfully--incredibly slow to turn, which bought them some time even as screamed with the sound of splintering boughs and struggled under the net.
"Humidity's high today, so there's probably not a fire warning?" She wasn't sure what that had to do with the situation at hand, but she wasn't given much time to think--the branches of the tree youma were quivering, and after a second it was firing actual pine cones at the two of them. "I mean, I thought this was everyone's idea of fun," the page flinched, arms up to try and deflect the worst of some of the fire. "Sun's out, there's nature everywhere, what's not to love?"
The tree began to lumber towards them once again, ripping up legs from its roots in the soil. As it crawled forward, both boughs began to lift, in anticipation of another downwards sweep. Chauvet took a step away, glancing nervously towards the other Knight. "But you make an excellent argument. What are we even supposed to do here?"
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Posted: Sun Oct 08, 2017 7:20 am
"Keep it distracted?" He called out, as his net more or less uselessly chipped bark fragments, and flashed an anxious look upward at it's quavering branches. (That. Would. HURT...) "And Hi again I guess?" He offered. "Sorry I kinda should have figured..." He yanked with the net, lashing again to try and entangle the lifting roots. He didn't have an axe, true, but maybe he could use some of his boosted strength to fell this goddamn Evil Ent a different way, which would be easier to deal and maybe buy him a window to concentrate on calling Asterion. "I'm... glad the thing with the code worked. That was uh... yeah." He admittedly didn't so much think about the success of purifying the code, or the idea it had provided that fed into his research... instead the first thing that jumped to mind was the accusations from Hvergelmer, that he wasn't smart enough to have guessed at the corruption plaguing the thing, and the lingering chaos poisoning that had dug its fingers into that resentment and tried to make it bloom. He still resented it, but mostly he winced at the embarrassment, and the thought he was going to be alone in getting out of a knight meeting without getting heckled like he'd heckled in the past. "Public speaking... isn't my strong suite." He admitted.
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Posted: Sun Oct 08, 2017 10:53 pm
"I can do that!!" Chauvet piped up, gathering the edges of her skirts in fistfuls of white and purple fabric to keep them off the forest floor. She waved at the evil tree spirit, shouted, "Over here!", and then leaned forward into a sprint, just barely passing under the swing of it's heavy boughs.
"Yeah, whatever happened back then, it made me sick as s**t," the page recalled, shimmying the fabric of her skirt in the late afternoon sun to act as a glittery fascinator. "I was in bed for like, two weeks, it was crazy! But I mean, the thing did say that we were taking in darkness or whatever, so I guess that's kind of on me. Should have checked the warning labels or something."
"It's all good, though--I think there was a lot going on in that room, and I didn't really get most of it anyway, so you're fine." The youma creaked and groaned, clambering for the Cosmos Page in what almost looked like slow motion. As it approached her, she'd take a few steps further back, and then glanced around for Kairatos, giving him an enthused thumbs up.
"So is this, like, your full time job or something?" she asked, scooping her ball back up to hand as she took another step backwards. The tree bristled, and pine cones went flying, but this time Chauvet was prepared, arms up to deflect the worst of the splinters. "Or are you just a volunteer magic park ranger gladiator guy?" She wasn't sure how long she was supposed to keep the thing distracted, but at this pace she could probably get a full interview out of the Mars Knight before the tree caught up to her.
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Posted: Sat Apr 21, 2018 3:40 pm
"I mean.... no?" Kairatos fumbled with the thought, wishing someone would pay him for this job, and turned his focus to concentrating on his Summon. "I was just trying to get some down time in..." He wondered how he'd be as a park ranger. Probably bad. Smokey the Bear would absolutely not approve of Asterion. Asterion, for his part, didn't much approve of the tree either, swinging his massive head around as he appeared just in time to be thwapped with several pine cones, which sizzled and crackled when they hit his broad, spectral sides. "I mean... I work with motors and stuff. I...fix stuff!" He was a Knight of Mars, and he guessed 'I fix stuff' was one way of looking at it. It was what he tried to do anyway. "Asterion! Charge!" He barked an order, gesturing at the tree, indicating in what he hoped was a thundering charge that would knock the thing away from Chauvet, but shifted on his feet, trying to be ready in case he had to try and knock her out of the way, or get himself out of the way, if the thing fell.
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