2025 Winter Holiday Prompt
Marshmallow Snow: (5) : 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.
Tress had just finished protecting her garden plants as best she could from the freshly-fallen snow, dusting as much as she could off of her leafy survivors and covering them with a sheet to keep off the worst of the frozen precipitation. She had turned around and begun walking back to her rented home when something felt like it was stuck to her foot. Curious, she looked down and noticed a bit of white stuff stretching from her shoe to the snow. Was that...gum? Ugh...how disgusting.
Tress had reached into her pocket to get a napkin or something to take the stuff off as she tried to continue to walk, but she soon began to realize it wasn't just one sticky patch. Soon, all of the surrounding snow was beginning to stick to her wherever it touched her - her shoes, he clothes, her hands...it was awful. And worst of all, it smelled...sweet. White, sticky, and sweet...like marshmallow creme. Was that what it was? Had someone decided to play a prank on her? In her own backyard? Upon taste-testing the sticky stuff, she discovered it really did taste as sweet as it smelled. She wondered how many insects would soon grow attracted to it.
The more she struggled to get free, the more the sticky goo clung to her. It wasn't cold, but Tress thought she maybe would have preferred that to it being so sticky. How was she ever going to get out of the stuff? And even if she did, would it ever get out of her clothes? Thank goodness her hair was short, so it wouldn't have much chance of reaching that unless it came from the sky. But that begged the question: where had it come from?
At first she began to wonder if it wasn't her neighbor, Bertrim, but then she realized he wouldn't have done something so childish. He loved plants and gardening like she did; he wouldn't have risked poisoning the soil or damaging the plants by wasting a ton of marshmallow creme just for a silly prank. But then who could it have been? A senshi? A youma? Was this some sort of trap to sap someone's energy or take their starseed?
Tress was debating on calling for help verbally or with her phone or even trying to power up to contact help that way, but eventually, she decided to calm down and sit for a little bit. If she wasn't going to be able to move anyway and her clothes and shoes were already ruined, she thought she might as well make herself comfortable for a little while as she tried to use her brain to logically get herself out of that mess.
It wasn't more than a few minutes of sitting in the strange, marshmallow creme snow, however, that Tress began to notice the stuff crystalize around her and start to feel cold again. Was it freezing?
When she tried to move and lift her shoes, the sticky strands of marshmallow snow instantly disintegrated into a powdery dust, allowing her to get free immediately and leaving behind no residue much to her great relief. Shaking her head at the strangeness of phenomenons like that in Destiny City, Tress sighed, picked herself back up, and continued forward into her house as she brushed off as much as she could of the powdery dust she soon became covered in.
Well...at least it wasn't marshmallow creme snow.
