Snowy Showdown (16) : There’s something magical about fresh fallen snow–completely undisturbed and untouched by the rest of the world. It should be relaxing and peaceful–a sign that no one has been around and you’re perfectly safe. Except, the best predators lie in wait, completely invisible to their prey. What do you do when a patch of snow starts clumping together and taking shape right before your eyes? When it all comes together, it looks like a person, only there are no features, just a snowy white form. Maybe there wouldn’t have been an issue if you hadn’t seen it, but it’s too late. In frantic, panicked movements, it lunges at you with icy fists. It feels like being pelted with snowballs, but each hit lowers your core body temperature–rapidly. The creature is highly susceptible to heat and will melt if exposed to it; if you hit it, snow splatters everywhere. It may attempt to reform, but eventually it loses strength. You might not want to stick around to see if it just needs a little more time. If the creature manages to knock you unconscious, you may wake up covered in snow and with a bad cold. You may be more aware of strange, snowy figures that seem to be standing around in odd places; who knows where these things are hiding?
Note: This strange snow monster is not a youma but can be used as a battle requirement for a character. It can only be used as a battle if there are two powered characters involved; you cannot write a solo and count this as a battle, and your character must be powered to meet battle requirements. You can use the prompt for as many characters as you like and it will count as a battle requirement, however if you repeat the prompt with the same character, only the first time will be usable as a battle.
The day was normal for a change. There was no urgent need to be someplace else. Amora felt like, for the first time in a while, that she could simply kick back her heels and relax. Although that was figuratively a metaphor. One simply could not kick back their heels and relax in a freshly snow-covered vista without succumbing to hypothermia after a period of time but it was nice to simply be able to stroll around as if she didn't have a care in the world. On the surface it would appear like that was the case but inside, deep down, Amora was still dealing with the fallout from the conversation that she had had with Reed. Who was she really if what Reed had said to be the truth? He'd found her on the battlefield, unconscious, but he said he hadn't seen her before that point. Was she truly just a senshi that had been caught up in the explosion and lost her memories that way, or was it as Ida had possibly implied, that she had been an Order senshi that had been forcibly corrupted? Or could it have been a mixture of both truth and lies?
Amora scrubbed at her face with her finger-less gloves before finding a bench that was miraculously free of snow already in order to sit down. How could she go about at least trying to find out the truth? Wisdom had been imparted to her from the senshi of orchids, but as her powered self, Hylonome had no idea if anyone knew her from before. How could she go seeking answers to something she didn't even know the answer to. It was that typical feeling of having a needle lost in a haystack. At least Reed had kept his word and they'd conversed. It hadn't been a pleasant conversation in the least though it had remained civilised. But it left a whole lot more questions that Amora wanted answers to. Was there anyone out there that had known her as more than just a corrupt senshi? If so, where would she start looking? It wasn't feasible to simply go around to every Order senshi she found to ask if they recognized her.
Amora brought her knees up onto the bench and wrapped her arms around them before sighing. This was becoming an all too familiar pose as of late. The last time she'd been like this it had been the Mauvian, Desiree, that had found her. She'd lost touch with the Guardian cat over the past couple of years and could only wish that she was doing well. It had been because of her that the Mauvian was batting for the Negaverse as she had purposely been seeking out anyone that would help her get corrupted. Hylonome had been all too willing to offer the assist teleport to take the cat into Negaspace.
For now though, she was alone ... or at least she thought she was. Her eyes tracked movement nearby and Amora gave the briefest grumble before locking eyes with the person she probably wanted to see the least of at the moment.
shiningamisgirl
sorry for re-quote. had to fix something.
Posted: Mon Dec 30, 2024 9:57 pm
“I brought you this—“ He had two, steaming, Christmas themed, brand labeled mugs with tightly fitted lids. They seemed to be from the sweet treats shop that popped up regularly at the same time every year. A winter wonderland of seasonal sun dries and drinks the masses seemed to love. Even himself, at times. Hopefully Amora, right now. He’d seen her in quiet passing from behind, thought ‘Ah yes, I can fix this! Here is the chance!’ It was only upon circling back with liquid courage in his hands that he realized how foolish he might’ve been…
He didn’t dare to wither beneath the look he received when Amora turned her eyes on him, it was mostly his pride that kept his spine straight; his attempt to bleed in frail, civilian garb the aura of a man unaffected. He was not entirely sure he was pulling it off, not in the slightest, and it was far easier to be an embittered a*****e than to be—
Goodness, whatever this was? Scorned, but not acting it? Feeling wrong, but knowing (and he did know!!) that he was in the right? He shook his head for it, mostly at himself, scattering the fringe of pink bangs out of his eyes. He was aware as a flayed nerve that this was not the same welcome he’d have received from her a year ago. There was no light jovialness, no hopeful questioning. Not even a hint of some brewing moral dilemma that would wind them down unique conversational pathways laden with existential landmines.
It was just Amora, tucked up on a bench, looking at him in a way that made his spirit shrivel into a raisin-like shape. If only it were as easy to outcast his soul as it was his feelings in these trying times—
“I thought, well…No, actually I assumed—“ A pauper's peace-offering. He offered the chance to wander with the knowledge he could be denied. Offered the drink with the knowledge it could be thrown in his face and the rest of his holiday time would end up being spent playing the starring role of lonely-phantom to his own personal, miserly opera in some bleakly lit hospital room.
“It’s cold out. Is all.” A lackluster dismount, a single shouldered shrug that could’ve been a shiver, for all that his long, tweed coat and thick sage-colored scarf hid as much of his frame as it did his shoulders.
“It might be warmer walking — there’s some sort of scene on display nearby? You know, with the lights.” As if the city would fade into some late ice age and become an obscura out of time and existence if it didn’t heap itself beneath metric tons of ornamental festivities! The parks always got it the worst, he knew, the child in him loathed it; the dead quiet, the cold ground, the greenery supplanted with gaudy lights and singing garlands and all the like! The man in him marveled at the accomplishment of another kind entirely, the work it took to take a space and leave it transformed by simple minds and simple hands
It was silent for a moment as Amora simply looked at the cup that Reed was holding out for her. A year ago, she wouldn't have hesitated to take it. But now she had to wonder if there were certain strings attached? Moments later though her fingers reached out and wrapped themselves around the mug and allowed the warmth to leech out of the mug and into her skin, only doing so much to chase away the chill that had settled over her. As much as she had taken the offering from Reed, Amora found that she couldn't quite look him in the eye as of yet. There was a slight inhale of the aroma drifting up from the vent hole in the lid and she sighed before the cup was placed on the bench next to her.
"You followed me," it wasn't quite an accusation but at the same time the young woman would need clarification that this simply wasn't somehow mere convenience that Reed had been able to track her down so easily. Her lips curled into what might have been a small frown before she tapped on the lid of the drink that had been offered to her before continuing, "actually I don't think I care to know if you have or haven't followed me. Too weird to think about it."
If it had been the same time last year Amora probably would not have hesitated to allow herself the pleasure of an outing simply enjoying the sights and sounds of the holiday season. Now things seemed strained, as if she were standing on thin ice, just waiting for the inevitable moment that the ice would crack and plunge her into a world that was even more hostile than where she was now.
Taking the mug that Reed had passed to her and taking a sip of whatever lay inside did Amora give the softest sound of frustration. Why was everything unravelling? Her gaze swung to meet that of the one who had tried to keep the truth from her before she'd forced him to tell her everything that he had known.
"I don't know if I should say thanks for the drink, I'm so confused right now. It'd be so much easier if I could walk away from all this, you know? I wouldn't have to worry about deceptions and half-truths or half-lies, or anything of the like. But something tells me that it wouldn't be that easy anymore. I know you wouldn't stop me but what of the rest of the organization? There's no way they'd let me go without a serious fight, right Reed?"
Her gaze moved to the direction that Reed had possibly been thinking of walking in for whatever light display had caught his attention even as a current on unease went through her. There wasn't a reason for it but still, even as Amora made a move to stand up from the bench she had been seated on could she not ignore that it felt like something was watching them. Watching this moment ...
shiningamisgirl
Posted: Sun Jan 05, 2025 1:30 am
He didn’t bother to refute the notion, to correct her assumptions here. If he’d followed her, seen her in passing? Did it really change the fact that he’d come up to her unprompted. That she truly didn’t trust him enough anymore that she had to question every slight interaction—
That did sit bitterly in the back of his mind, a rancid taste and yearning for how sweet their moments together once had been, before becoming what they were now; terse things layered neath suspicion. He sighed for it, a soft huff, icy in the wind, turning his gaze and meeting the sternness of her expression with his own unflinching frown.
*At least she took it from me.*
He told himself and let it be enough, her strained acceptance, the fact that she hadn’t thrown it back in his face.
“You underestimate your own importance to the organization.” And yet he owned a graveyard, had a precious friend buried in it. He wasn’t sure if it was honesty? Or his own overconfidence in his ability to bargain for Hylonome thr as he would've for any of his girls — for his team — “And to me, since we’re trying to avoid half-measures and partial truths between us.” He sighed roughly, he was hoping to eliminate them, to try and do so at the very least. He wasn’t sure which promises he could make to her anymore, which ones he could effectively keep without straying the other and failing her all over again.
“So in that you are correct…there would be a serious fight over you. If for different reasons than you might fear..” It was easier to do this while walking, with a background distraction and light noise. He shrugged off the cloying ominous feeling as one of his own internal design, focusing on Amora and her alone. “You do know…you can ask me anything, right? That I never meant for you to feel…” He waived his hand ungraciously, grasped at straws and air.
“I just wanted for you to have a home. A true home, Amora…” He so dearly wanted to tell her. Like how there were no missing posters, no search parties, no families full of tears. How his friend had died for order and yet order clearly had not mourned him! They certainly hadn’t gone to bury the body—
He wanted to tell her how her fate would never be the same as Ochres had been—-
Amora sighed. Her gaze had picked nothing out on the short scan of the area that she had felt the sensation of being watched from but yet the feeling persisted. Instead of dwelling on it though the brunette effectively tuned into what Reed was telling her. Her expression grew pensive as the words that tumbled from his lips reached her ears. Biting back the sarcastic reply that wanted to emerge Amora instead waited until Reed had finished his little spiel. It stung her to realize just how much of a betrayal that she still held against him.
Her gaze lowered to the cup that she held in her hands before the truth of what Reed was telling her now sunk in. So it was true then that the Negaverse wouldn't easily let her go now that she was one of them. That stung. But how the whole situation had been handled from the beginning stung even more and that was what she wanted to now know about. Why hadn't the truth been told from the start? Wouldn't it have been better to know the truth instead of lies?
"I can't say that I'm not surprised to hear that I can't just up and leave. I hadn't exactly expected that it would be that easy. But Reed, in your haste to make it feel like a home the lies that you fed to me when I didn't know who I was seemed to have made the situation a lot worse than it had to be."
Sitting back on the bench of the table did Amora stare back into the distance for a moment. When she spoke next her voice was sotto soft, "it's just too much to try to sort out now: what's a lie and what is the truth. How can I go on believing things that people tell me?"
Oh god.
Amora felt as if she couldn't breathe for a moment after revealing that tidbit. Why was she oversharing so much? The young woman gave a quick glance to Reed before her gaze went down to the ground. It would have been so nice if it would just open up and swallow her whole.
