Predatory Puddles (6) : Summer rains aren’t uncommon, so finding puddles dotting your path isn’t in itself particularly surprising or abnormal. However, as you walk past them, you feel the sensation of being watched, like eyes are on you. If you look into the puddles, you don’t see your reflection--nor the reflection of anything familiar to you. Instead, you see strange, decayed buildings, and odd, rotting plants. Something is watching you through the puddles, but before you can investigate, between one blink and the next, it’s all gone. When you look back, the puddles are oddly non-reflective, and then in the next blink, they’re all gone. The feeling of being watched doesn’t fade, though.
The rest of the day had gone without incident and by nightfall, Lavendulan's glamor had worn off completely. She was tired, which was to be expected after holding her civilian appearance for so long. But now that she had the cover of nightfall on her side, the half-youma no longer needed to worry about hiding and could investigate the bizarre puddle she had encountered earlier that day.
Thankfully, the last few hours of the sun weren't enough to completely dry up all the puddles. Most were small, no larger than a hand mirror, and really didn't offer anything worth seeing. One blink and the image of rotting plants or crumbling buildngs were gone.
"This is getting me nowhere!" Lavendulan pursed her lips in frustration. She needed a bigger puddle, or hell... a lake would do. Anything with a bigger surface area where she could get a better glimpse at this dying world. It was almost becoming an obsession at this point, a need to know if she could somehow reach the other side of this reflection if only because she had an affinity with water and could turn into water herself.
"That's it! Why didn't I try that earlier?" If an epiphany was physical thing then Lavens face would have stung with a metaphorical handprint from being slapped so hard with the realization that she could quite literally shift into the form of the thing she was looking for... water.
The Aqua Shift was a seamless transition as her form became almost completely transparent; it held its shape easily but moved freely around tree branches or obstacles that would have otherwise been in her way. Lavendulan teleported once to a taller building that overlooked a sizeable parking lot; big puddles and potholes everywhere. All she needed now was one that looked decidedly out of place.
"Piece of cake," she commented before stepping off the ledge and free fell to the ground a few stories below. In this form, she moved as quick as any General or Knight which helped since this lot was big enough to withstand a horde of shoppers on Black Friday.
Infinities
Posted: Wed Jun 16, 2021 10:12 am
Pythia was losing her mind. Of that much she was certain. Most rainy days were relaxing, and she would meander out under her umbrella, splashing her water-proofed boots cheerfully through the summer-warmed puddles, not even belligerent over the way her hair frizzed in the humidity. And yet not this one. Since early this morning she had been feeling like people were staring at her. It had taken everything in her not to whip her head to and fro the whole damnable day, looking for whomever was testing their luck. The redhead was unused to the creeping feeling of paranoia that had been following her every time she stepped outside.
The strange part was that the feeling of being watched hadn’t vanished after she stepped outside that night. She had even chosen a different exit than she usually took, just in case, but even as Imbrium she could still feel her skin crawling as she walked down the alleys, across parking lots, and over rooftops. She didn’t step in the puddles, this time, which might be why they suddenly seemed to draw her eyes to them. They were, at times… strange. A feeling of wrongness from the corner of her eye, but when she looked back at the puddles everything was fine.
The next time she approached, Imbrium’s wariness was at the ready, her buckler gripped tightly by a white-knuckled hand. “Alright,” she muttered, squinting at the puddle, “I don’t-” Recognize anything in that reflection. The architecture was all wrong, and there were plants visible in the puddle that wouldn’t be visible at all, not near this particular building. And it felt… like eyes… and she was so close to seeing something… Startled, she jerked back, instinct turning her attention to the distinctly modern architecture that should have been reflected by the water. Any water, not just… this specific water.
Frazzled, she turned her attention back to the puddle and… there was nothing. Nothing at all. Her blood froze in her veins like her magic had been cast on it, the feeling of wrongness only intensifying as she stared into this formerly-normal-seeming puddle like it had turned into a mass of… bad. Words escaped her as she tried not to blink at the seemingly matte liquid; nature, however, won out. In the space between her lids closing and jerking open again, the creepy thing vanished from sight. A slow shudder worked its way along the Squire’s spine like creepy, slow fingers, and she gave an audible brr shuddering noise as her mostly-bare shoulders goose-bumped.
She KNEW the puddles had just been there. They had been everywhere on the lot, scattered around like they had been left from a water-balloon fight, broken and streaked from cars driving through them, or splattered under cart corrals, pooled against the concrete of parking barriers. Imbrium might be losing her mind, but she wasn’t absolutely out of it yet; she knew the puddles had been real. She backed up a few steps nervously, and then turned to the left, intending to get out of this creepy, creepy place and go back home or something- maybe take a nap, maybe she had been having too many late nights recently?- and couldn’t stop her high-pitched screech as a massive bucket of water fell from the sky, almost landing on top of her and drenching her.
Her foot slammed into the ground in panic, and her shield went over her head to try and block the falling water as she froze. Fight or Flight instincts were still set to helpless herbivore, some distant part of her brain commented snidely; because staying out in the rain always kept the clouds from emptying, right?
The sudden shrill scream startled Lavendulan in her descent and before hitting the ground, or the girl for that matter, she teleported a short distance away. It took a long moment for her to come down from the reeling rush of freefalling to realize that this wasn't some ordinary civilian out wandering late at night.
No...
If the shield and blue gladiator-styled outfit wasn't a dead giveaway, then the noticeably strong aura radiating from her sure as hell was. How the hell did she not realize there was a knight in the vicinity? Was she truly just that focused on this strange reflection that tunnel vision made her lose sight of her surroundings? Or perhaps they just powered up. Either way, her lack of environmental awareness was startling and Lavendulan knew that Wolframite would surely scold her if he found out how careless she had been.
There were two choices; leave and come back later, or make them leave instead. I was here first that childish voice in the back of her head pointed out and, with steadfast determination, refused to let her entertain the idea of fleeing.
The half-youma, still in her watery form, stood in the spotlight of a street lamp; one of the few that illuminated the parking lot. The surface tension of her current form shimmered under the light when her weight shifted from one foot to the other. She smirked, amused by the way the knight coward behind her buckler.
"Scared of a little rain?" Lavendulan held a hand out and above her open palm she summoned a medicine ball sized water droplet and lazily tossed it towards the fiery-haired woman. There was no force behind the action and when the globe barely touched the silver shield, it popped like a child's water balloon.
Infinities
Posted: Thu Jun 17, 2021 5:17 pm
The waterfall teleported, and frankly, that was a dead giveaway that this wasn’t a bucket-fall of water or an inconveniently-timed spot of rain. That was the moment when the redhead sighed, and reached out with her senses to find- Yep.
Chaos.
Under the light, the water-creature shimmered, and Imbrium shifted, hand tightening on her silver shield. “No!” she burst out in answer to the creature’s amused question, and braced herself against the oncoming water globe. Was it acid? Would it melt her buckler? Would it-
It tapped her buckler, ever-so-lightly, and popped. Droplets of water trickled down the silvery metal and Pythia felt her cheeks heat with embarrassment. Bright pink, from the tip of her nose, spreading all the way to the ends of her ears.
Quickly, aggressively, she fired off a question to the creature, trying to hide her shameful display. “Are you the puddle?!” she demanded. It was, she thought, a logical question. If she had said it correctly. Obviously the water-thing wasn’t a puddle. BUT the puddle had vanished right around the time this speck of Chaos appeared, so there was a chance that People was Puddles.
Are you responsible for the puddle she should have asked, she realized as her mouth snapped shut, but even then the answer could have been mocking her.
The half-youma's head leaned to the side in a curious manner; equal parts amused and confused by the question until she realized that the knight likely thought she was the monster in the reflection.
I wish, she mentally commented with a smirk.
Her form shimmer and shifted and as her magic began to wane, Lavendulan stepped out of the ring of light and into the shadows "And what if I am?" she asked rather than answer the question outright.
Icy blue eyes, with pupils pulled tight into thin slits, looked the knight over appraisingly, and after a moment's pause she crossed both arms and tapped her sharp nails against the scales along the side of her left arm.
Infinities
Posted: Fri Jun 18, 2021 1:53 pm
She wasn't mortified, she wasn't mortified, she wasn't mo-
Okay fine, maybe Imbrium was a little embarrassed by the way her entire body seemed to freeze and flinch as the watery creature seemed to tilt what was probably its head- water did not have a head, Pythia- and the redhead's instinctive response to her own shame was fury.
"No," she snapped, and lifted her shield, shoving it forward and channeling her magic as the creature began to step into the shadows, "You stay right where I can see you." The magical burst formed a brief ice wall- Imbrium's intent only being to warn, and perhaps keep the- the whatever-from leaving the light and vanishing into a darkness where the Squire's own vision was sorely lacking.
"If you're that nasty little puddle thing, I have some words for you." Most of them were profanity, so she hoped the creature- which her brain could now fill in seemed not unlike one of the youma- was old enough to not be shocked. "Whether you are or not, though, you seem a bit smarter than your average Chaos Monster. None of them seemed to be able to play the little vanishing hallucination puddle act."
Lavendulan held her hands up in surrender and took a step backward into the spotlight again. Smarter than your average Chaos Monster. "I feel like I should take that as a compliment." She replied with an amused grin. First time someone has ever offered up 'kind' words like that to her.
"While I'm intrigued by what words you'd have for me. Let me be clear," she lowered her arms and crossed them in front of her, and while it seemed that she was content to maintain some semblance of distance between them, Lavendulan teleported once more. Rather than appearing below a different light, she stood behind the Page and leaned forward to whisper, "I'm a half-youma."
Knowing that startling someone in that manner usually resulted in a knee-jerk reaction of either them jumping away, or the more likely option of being swung at, the Captian lept backward a fair distance away if only to avoid being punched in the face. "Half-water dragon to be exact..." Again she leisurely walked over to the light where her features could more easily be seen; horns, scales, slitted pupils eyes, and claws that were sharp enough to rend skin and fabric easily.
"And before you start accusing me of Starseed or energy stealing, be aware I'm not interested in either of those." At least not tonight she mentally added. "I'm out here for the same reason you are. Or so I assume..." With a pointed claw, she pointed at a large puddle between them. The surface tension shifted and the brief image of large broken concrete slabs with moss and ivy crawling up one side suddenly disappeared and in its place was her own reflection again.
Infinities
Posted: Mon Jun 21, 2021 7:54 pm
"You really shouldn't take it as a compliment," Imbrium shot back dryly, "They have set a terribly low bar." The Castor knight's back was up, and her brow furrowed as she took in the amusement on the creature's face. Amusement was not an ego-boosting reaction to Pythia's attempt at aggression, and the Squire stiffened her spine, trying to look more confident and less annoyed.
She thought there was a possibility that her bluff-coated confidence may have worked until the damn thing teleported. She really wished that they hadn't said they wanted to be clear. They were part water- that was clear enough for Imbrium, thank you. Yet there was no time for her to pull the snarky comment to the tip of her tongue before the whisper of sound was her warning, and-
Half Youma.
The redhead spun, shield punching outward and her ice wall rushing forward as Imbrium channeled; she wanted something between them, anything to make her feel just a tidbit less freaked out by the fact that perhaps, in an extreme, EXTREME circumstance, her drinking water could talk. There was nothing worse than the idea of getting into the shower, turning on the water, and a talking youma rushing out of the pipes complaining they'd been stuck there all day. Or, you know, sassing her from the cup. And if she developed aquaphobia thanks to this thing, she'd find it again and-- and freeze it or something.
"I mean, that's a cool look, but also no?" Imbrium shook her head, vague horror crossing her features. Not that someone else's bad life choices were any of her business. "Honestly, though, before you start accusing me of accusing you, maybe you should calm down. I'm just out here minding my own business and getting creeped on by vanishing puddles and then you came along like the weirdest rainfall ever. I'm going to have nightmares getting into my bathtub for weeks."
Imbrium kept her shield up, squinting to where the creature pointed, almost crossing her eyes in an attempt to both keep an eye on the half-youma as well as the puddle that was being pointed to. She could see something, but before she could inch closer, or shift to take a better look, she blinked; the image vanished and Imbrium cursed. "So. You things don't know what this is either? You're water, can't you just like... dive on in?"
Lavendulan rolled her eyes at the insults; none of them were new. Whether they took a jab at her appearance or intelligence it really didn't matter; agents use to call her fish face when she was newly conscripted into this stupid war. Hell, there was a civilian that literally had an accident when they realized she was nearby; that was embarrassing for both of them.
Then again, the first time she saw her own reflection in the window pane, she too freaked out thinking someone had played a cruel joke on her.
Nonetheless, over the last two years, Laven had grown used to how she looked and even felt attractive; kinda. At least Wolframite, and for a time Tinaksite, didn't mind the horns and scales and could have a conversation without staring owlishly at her uniqueness.
Words were just that, words. They held no bite and could be easily ignored or thought of as ignorance especially when coming from someone of the opposite faction; there was so much they didn't know or understand and she didn't have the time to spill her entire life story to someone who would probably just cover their ears like a child going 'la la la la' and claiming they can't hear her.
If anything she just felt bored as they often rambled on senselessly. That is, until the knight spun around and threw up another shield between them.
Lavendulan took a staggered step backwards and fixed a pointed glare at the Page. Nice trick... she thought to herself, wondering how long the young woman could keep it up as she dug her claws into the wall and scratched out a chunk of ice.
Her ears perked when heard the question. You're water, can't you like... dive on in? This time a smile pulled the corners of her lips into a wicked grin. She hummed thoughtfully and stepped around the ice wall. "Perhaps we should try it," Without much warning the half-youma's form shifted back into water and with the speed attributed to most Generals she charged towards the Knight.
"Might want to hold your breath..." And without a moment's hesitation the two signatures that once stood in the open parking lot blinked out of existence only to reappear somewhere else in Destiny City. Some place much darker, damper and most definitely below the surface.
Infinities
LMK if this works. She teleported them into the reservoir to be picked up in the next RP.
