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Prompt 11 (Marshmallow Snow): Fresh-fallen snow coats Destiny City. It’s pristine and crisp, and it crunches as you walk through it. It may be a few inches deep, but it doesn’t seem to go above your calves when walking. At first, it’s easy enough to walk through, but gradually you realize that it’s getting harder to move. Every step you take feels like the snow is pulling you back in, and if you get a good look you might realize that sticky white fluff is clinging to you. The more you walk, the more it pulls, until you’re almost completely stuck. Something about the snow smells oddly sweet, and the tacky, marshmallow-like snow seems like it’s suddenly become a prison. The more you try to break free, the stickier it gets, and you’d better hope you don’t fall down. The more you struggle the harder it is to escape, but if you manage to stay still for a few minutes, the marshmallow will freeze and crystallize. When you move again, the snow will turn into a powdery dust and you can break free easily. The only good thing about this is that you won’t starve if you get trapped–the snow tastes just like marshmallows.
Caelyna was prepared. She had gathered data, collected supplies, and made a plan for her mission.
That her mission was to recover some of the strange, allegedly marshmallow flavored snow that her fellow Vanguardians had reported and not something of greater importance was not important. Small task or large, it was critically important to be prepared. Velyria had drilled that into her over the years, making sure she knew and understood how important it was to always be prepared for whatever one might encounter. That was deeply important to ensuring the success of any given mission. Even something small, and petty, and mostly for fun.
Ever since she had seen the first reports on her ComTech of a strange, flavored snow, one that changed textures over time, she knew that she had to have it. It would make for a fascinating ingredient in Earth cooking--and perhaps this was a good substitute for the "marshmallow fluff" some of the recipes she had found spoke of!! Going into a store to purchase ingredients was fun and easy, of course, but she wanted to test this. And so she had stocked up on the ingredients for a dessert called "fudge"--allegedly some sort of chocolate treat--and acquired enough for two quite large batches. One, she would make with traditional "marshmallow fluff." The other, she would use the strange snow. It would be a fascinating experiment, she was sure.
Assuming she could find it and make use of it. And find enough of it. But that was why she had a temperature-sealed bag full of the glass containers humans called "Mason jars" and lined with artificial ice packs, because there might need to be repeated trials, and she would have to be smart. She would also need to keep it cold, since she didn't want to test if it might melt on her and then become unusable.
Perhaps she would even have to do multiple collections. That would be fun and interesting.
So she was out in the city, in her human guise, projecting a lovely winter Lolita ensemble she had found at the lovely little boutique she now regularly frequented, and she sought out snow that seemed different form the rest. It wasn't exactly easy; there was lots of snow everywhere, and she had to walk a while before she found enough that was undisturbed that she would feel comfortable collecting it regardless.
On a whim, she collected a jar of ordinary snow--it would be beneficial, she thought, to bring both home and analyze the differences between an ordinary snowfall and the strange stuff.
If she could find it.
She was beginning to feel disheartened, tromping around the city, finding patches of ordinary snow and nothing that resembled the strange tales she'd heard. But finally, there it was--she put her boot into a patch of snow, moved to pull it out....and it stuck.
Caelyna whooped with joy, pulling out one of her jars, and scooping it full of the strange substance. With a giggle of delight, she scribbled notes on it: location, time collected, so on. No need to be anything but scientifically rigorous about this, after all! After that, it was only a matter of waiting patiently for it to turn into its crumbly state (she pondered collecting that, too, but it seemed to only change close to her, and she was not risking adding dirty snow to her recipes--ugh; she would have to do other testing on that) and then it was onward to the next.
She darted around the city, a beacon of frosty joy, collecting jar after jar and stuffing her cooler bag full. Finally, she ran out of samples, and with a cheery whistle, she turned to head home.
There was so much cooking to be done.
