Welcome to Gaia! ::

It was late at night when Shar crawled in the door. Every muscle in her body ached from getting her arse kicked to and fro across the gym tonight; there were even some aches in muscles that the Negaverse agent didn’t quite remember that she had. The studio apartment felt particularly lonely tonight as she kicked her shoes off, bending over briefly to flip the light switch on with a bare shoulder and kicking the door shut behind her. She didn’t bother to lock it; anyone who tried to break into her barren little apartment and steal what little she owned now deserved what would be coming to them.

The room was barren, and certainly a step down from where she had lived while her father was still subsidizing her bills; parental guilt only went on so long, however, and at 29 Shar was in a position where she needed to start paying her own way. Negaverse General wasn’t the best-paying gig, and Destiny City didn’t exactly have a lot of ruins needing excavation, so she wasn’t working in her field- so part time jobs it was. She wanted a job at the museum, but… that wasn’t something in the cards right now. Someday. She’d made a wish for it on that ridiculous tree, and all.

The mail fell from her fingers onto the small table next to the couch, and among all the bland white envelopes and colorful magazine pages that had been shoved into her mailbox was a small bag, which had been hidden from view by one of the thick, rolled up coupon magazines; it wasn’t a particularly eye-catching little thing, but it was enough of an oddity that Shar paused and picked it up in calloused fingers. There was even a cute little Sapphire star charm on it, suggesting that it was a gift from the city. “And what are you?” she muttered to the little bag in her mother’s tongue, carrying it with her as she moved into the bedroom area. “Happy Star Festival?” Flopping down on the bed, tired fingers pulled open the string, and teal eyes blinked as star candies fell into the sheets.

She should have known. Leave it to Destiny City to waste money on sending candy to their residents to celebrate some ridiculous little festival. They could have just passed out the bags at the tree, but instead they spent postage on this sort of thing! They could have done so much else with the tax money they had just spent on city-wide postage. And this- this was why Shay would never get into politics. How wasteful, and someone had thought this was a good idea, and signed off on it. Really.

As tired as Shar was, the candy seemed to glow with some kind of inner light. Did that mean she’d probably have a migraine tomorrow? That was the last thing that she needed. Alright then- hydration time, and a shower. Picking up a few of the fallen candies, Shay pushed up off the bed with a grunt, stuffing the sugary handful into her mouth. All the PSAs said not to eat candy from a stranger, but after of all the risky things Shar had eaten? A few poisoned candies probably wouldn’t be what took her into the next life.

The candy crunched pleasantly in her teeth, and Shar sauntered into the kitchen, turning on the faucet and shoving her head under the stream of water. She was too lazy to dirty a glass at the moment. So she just enjoyed the fresh, cool running water over her overheated skin until she was done, then she turned off the faucet and stood, stretching her spine. Sugar and water- nourishment. Kind of. Yet when she looked around the room—something was distinctly wrong…

Her furniture was somehow seemingly bigger, puffier, differently-colored than before. There were lines and curves, dents, and it looked almost… artsy. She was out of her da*n mind. Had she been wrong? Could there have been something in those candies? Well- there must have been. Chances of there being drugged tap water were slim, but did drugs usually turn your apartment into cartoons?

…. It looked like something straight out of Rainbow Brite. And, frankly, it wasn’t the weirdest thing to ever happen to her. Opening her front door, Shar stared into the brightly-cartoonated hallway, watching a thickly-lined moth with spindly legs float around one of the lights that decorated the concrete path.

Shutting the door, Shahar took a moment to actually lock it this time before turning on a heel and moving to the bathroom. “Rainbow Brite,” she sang off-key as she turned on the water in her also-cartoonated bathroom and stepped into a tub that was much nicer than the one she had when she wasn’t high, “See the shining light… rainbow colors gonna cheer you up… Magic Light… Gonna take you for a riiiide…”

She might as well enjoy it while it lasted.