Path to Nowhere (14) : There are many parks in Destiny City, and if you’re willing to venture to the outskirts of the city you can find an incredibly vast forest system. It’s unlikely that anyone has explored every inch of the forest, but it’s still odd when a strange path into the forest suddenly appears in an area that you thought you knew pretty well. Where there was once just a wall of trees, now there is a faded wooden board with an old fashioned, thatched roof with a thick layer of moss. Pinned to the board, behind broken glass, is yellowed paper. The portrait of a woman wearing vintage clothes watches you with an eerie smile. A map used to be here; you can see where the corners are pinned, but someone has torn it out. A few dried flowers are pinned to the board. Someone has pinned a message that says ‘DO NOT ENTER’ and ‘DANGER’. The path is eerie but doesn’t appear dangerous otherwise. Dark shadows fill the space between the trees, and sometimes you can make out mushroom covered logs in the distance. Many flowers grow but they all appear half wilted or dying. The path winds on for what feels like forever once you are on it. If you’re lucky you can turn around and find your way out, but once you start walking, the path seems like it forever winds. You can walk until you collapse, or until you fall asleep. If you make it into the heart of the forest, you will find a giant tree with branches so heavy that they droop towards the ground, and a strange, bright-eyed owl that watches you from the branches. It’s too dark to see beyond that; regardless of the time of day it was when you entered, it always appears to be nighttime here. A slow breeze disrupts a sea of half-dead dandelions, and suddenly white wisps swirl around you and your vision fades. Whether you exhausted yourself trying to get out, or if you made it to the heart of the forest, you cannot escape the wave of sleep that falls upon you. When you wake up, you’ll be in your bed but you won’t remember how you got there. You can find the path again, if luck wills it, but all trips end up the same.
So.
This was very clearly a bad choice, right? Stribor peered at the signs saying danger, do not enter, etc, and then down the path they seemed to mean it for. None of it... Well.. It seemed spooky enough, sure. But he... He had the terrible feeling that someone probably had gone down this path. A gut instinct. Something told him to go in, urged him forwards, wanting him to help, because, well, he was a senshi, after all. Stronger than the average person in this form. He could help.
A small piece of torn clothing stood out to him and he shivered, staring it down. That explained the gut instinct, then. Some part of his subconcious had noticed that along the path before he'd really took concious note of it, then.
An aura appeared on his radar and he looked up and around from studying the path—they seemed like a friendly one, and if he could get some more help down this path...
"Hello," he called out. "I could use some help, if you're not busy, whoever you are!"
as he waited for a response, a glimmer caught his eye and he stooped to pick up a lost little star charm, then pocketed it.
Noir Songbird x
Posted: Fri Jul 05, 2024 4:45 pm
Sonora was not one for spooky things. She liked to think that she might just survive a horror movie, because her response to ghosts, spirits, monsters, and murderers was a hearty "not today." Move, sell the house, get out of the state. Obviously.
Then again, her response to actual magic and actual monsters had not in fact been to do any of those things, so maybe she was less of a scaredy cat than she thought. Still, she did not like these spooky woods, and only the presence of her little cosmic wisp lighting the path with its ethereal glow kept her from freaking out and turning around to leave at maximum speed.
But there was a voice. Someone calling out. And maybe--maybe it was the Senshi she felt, and maybe they needed help, like she'd needed help with those awful evil trees. The thought of leaving someone else in potential danger didn't sit well with her, and so she turned down the path, jogging to get closer.
There was indeed a Senshi--a handsome young man with rabbit ears, which meant he was one of the ones from outer space, like her new roommate, Cyrus.
Once they were close enough, her wisp winked out, leaving for wherever it went--clearly assured that it had delivered her to a friend who would look after her in its stead.
Even if that didn't feel entirely reassuring, looking at the warnings to stay away from this particular creepy path deeper into the woods.
"Were you the one calling for help?" She asked, just to make sure, because this place felt extremely haunted and who knew, really. "I'm Sonora. Nice to meet you, even if this isn't the nicest place for it."
Stribor nodded, giving the space where a wisp had been a curious glance, but deciding against asking. This was absolutely not the right time to ask weird questions. Well. That depended on one's definition of weird... But. Not the point, not the point!
"Heh. Nice to meet you as well, Sonora. I'm Stribor," he said, his left ear bending in half in his formal greeting. "I think there's someone in trouble down this trail—people aren't good at leaving well enough alone."
He gestured with an awkward laugh to the danger signs, and then further out to the torn cloth he could see down the trail. "Something's telling me someone down there needs help. I figured best not to go alone, once I sensed your aura."
Noir Songbird
Posted: Fri Jul 05, 2024 5:12 pm
Oh. Well. If someone was potentially in danger....that changed the entire calculus of the situation. Sure, Sonora was inclined to avoiding fights. Sure, she hated conflict. Sure, the thought of going down that path and encountering whatever might be there made her very, very nervous.
But that torn piece of cloth made her heart sink.
Someone was in danger. Someone needed help. And she was a Knight. It was, as she'd told Cryptomelane, her soul-born sacred duty to do so.
"You're right, better to go together," she said, and she took a breath. "My magic makes a shield, so I can protect us from anything with hostile intentions. Us, and whoever left that behind, if we get to them in time." She didn't want to think of the alternative, not for longer than a moment.
"Let's go," she said, and she stepped forward, onto the path. "Stick close for safety, but hopefully this isn't...too long."
Wow. She was cool. If his heart hadn't already been stolen... Well, he might have considered it. She was nice, though. He liked her.
"My magic isn't anything like a shield," he said quietly as they made their way in. "But it can reduce hostility in anything trying to come at us. You shield us, I get it to calm down... Hopefully... And thudam, we're okay."
At least... from any physical threats. Anything magical, like constantly getting lost... Neither of their magics would work for that, he reckoned. The path wound and wound, deeper and deeper into the forest. He started getting disoriented easily and shook his head, pressing the heels of his hands into his eyes so hard he saw fireworks.
"I haven't seen any other signs of people," he mumbled to Sonora. "Maybe I was wrong...? This doesn't feel.... right."
Noir Songbird
Posted: Fri Jul 05, 2024 6:02 pm
Sonora nodded. Stribor's assessment made perfect sense--together, they'd be a powerful team for ending things without hostilities.
Which Sonora liked. That was probably her most preferred method, actually.
"Sounds perfect," she said, simply--but most of her attention was on the strange path as it twisted and wound deeper into the woods. It made her skin crawl, and the longer they walked, the more she hated it.
"This place is...strange," she acknowledged. "Do you think...could we turn around and go back? Maybe whoever left that piece of cloth is already gone..." At least, she wanted to hope so, because that would mean no one else was trapped in this weird wood.
Stribor nodded slowly, stopping to listen. He heard nothing but normal woodsy sounds. Which was almost creepier. He turned around slowly, carefully, and noted with relief that he could still see the path. Not... where it went... And he hoped that it just led them right back out to where they'd been before they'd ventured down this fruitless path.
"I hope they made it out, same as we are trying to," he said quietly, moving forward.
Leaving seemed to go a lot quicker than entering had, as it seemed like just a few moments had passed before they'd made their way back to the entrance.
"Well. Never trying that again," he said with a little laugh. "Thank you for trying. Glad I had company—I dunno that I would have stayed half as calm by myself."
Noir Songbird
Posted: Fri Jul 05, 2024 6:39 pm
They made it out. Sonora felt a sense of relief so strong she thought it might bowl her over, when they stepped back onto the main path they'd so carelessly left.
It had seemed like the right idea, Sonora supposed. And maybe it had been in some way or another, but it was also the right idea, she was pretty sure, to get out of there before it got any creepier.
"I'm glad for it too. That was...awful. But we had each others' backs."
She exhaled.
"I, um. Think that's enough Knight-ing for me tonight, I'm gonna go home and bake or something." Because she needed to make something to calm her still-frayed nerves. "But! It was really cool meeting you, Stribor! Even if the circumstances sucked!"
Hopefully they would run into each other again. With less creepy next time.
