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Conversations with Dead People
Oct. 31st, 2012 10:35 pmSkellig has gotten himself worked into a fine state over a creature in their newest city (lots of good food, still not cold enough to have a proper winter). She's prowling through the Gloom tonight, both mapping the unfamiliar town and looking for any clues as to what is upsetting Skellig so.
She is distracted, momentarily, by a trio of cats scrapping down an alley way, visible even two levels deep in the Gloom, all three turning to hiss at her once she is close enough. She laughs at their ire, then frowns.
There are gouges here, cut deep into the buildings. The signs of a fight in close quarters, a no-holds-barred brawl like she used to get into on a regular basis. Her delicate fingers trace the outline of the scars, cut deep into the brickwork. Odd. Very odd. It is almost as if...
There is a shout, in the distance. Not a shout, a battlecry, and she isn't even thinking as she races through the streets, her furred paws tearing into the ground to gain traction. She isn't thinking when ahead, she can see the flash and flare of spells being loosed, illuminating a knot of men and women in white, surrounded by creatures foul. She isn't thinking when she catches their attention with a low guttural roar, catching a lizard in leathers across the throat and bearing it down under her weight.
It's the silence that brings her head up, a paw still heavy over her prey's chest to keep it pinned. They're staring at her - the people in white, the creatures (though most of the latter are taking this moment to get the heck out of Dodge). They're staring, with varying expressions of grief, shock, horror, and fury.
"Katya?" The smallest asks soft and low, and Katya blinks because she knows that shock of dirty blonde hair, cut short and dyed at the ends despite her mentor's best attempts at monitoring her. But it's quickly hidden from sight as the others close rank ahead of the child, defenses to the fore. She can feel the menace hidden in the hands of the man with the intellectual face (Garik, drinking and arguing fiercely in her library while they hid from the summer heat), she can see naked fury on the face of the man built like a male model (Ignat, exclaiming in despair over the state of her hair), she can feel the burn from the curses leveled at her from the stocky man in the center (Seymon, laughing uproariously as she went toe-to-toe with him, all frizz and spark and not older than fourteen, trying to defend her chosen street name and failing horribly).
The fur melts away and she rises, suddenly realizing that the buildings around her are as familiar as her bangles, which she knows better than her hands (back or front) - her hands change, her bangles never have. Home. She's home, she's home, these are her people, her watch, she's home. She takes a step forward, beaming, and is knocked fiercely back on her ass by a wall of cold, summoned by Seymon's abrupt gesture. She opens her mouth to protest, but he's too quick, cutting her off.
"Begone, shade of the past - you are not called or summoned, and have no cause here." The words cut, his expression crushes. There is no welcome there, no hope, no joy. She scrambles to find her feet again, because she will not be sent away so easily, they may doubt but she will take her rightful place back.
Or, at least, that was her plan... before all three gesture, and she recognizes it a second too late, the icy-cold breath of the Gloom suddenly cutting through her protection, the buildings wavering through watering eyes. She shields herself without thought, her hands and arms raised in front of her face in a quick sweeping gesture.
And when she lowers her arms, she is alone. Alone, in the center of an unfamiliar square, staring at signs in English and the trappings of American culture. When she returns to the abandoned loft they have nested in, she brings with her vodka and pastries that are just a little too sweet for her tastes and a little too dry for his, and when she does not explain, he is still there, more real than the memories she cannot explain.
She is distracted, momentarily, by a trio of cats scrapping down an alley way, visible even two levels deep in the Gloom, all three turning to hiss at her once she is close enough. She laughs at their ire, then frowns.
There are gouges here, cut deep into the buildings. The signs of a fight in close quarters, a no-holds-barred brawl like she used to get into on a regular basis. Her delicate fingers trace the outline of the scars, cut deep into the brickwork. Odd. Very odd. It is almost as if...
There is a shout, in the distance. Not a shout, a battlecry, and she isn't even thinking as she races through the streets, her furred paws tearing into the ground to gain traction. She isn't thinking when ahead, she can see the flash and flare of spells being loosed, illuminating a knot of men and women in white, surrounded by creatures foul. She isn't thinking when she catches their attention with a low guttural roar, catching a lizard in leathers across the throat and bearing it down under her weight.
It's the silence that brings her head up, a paw still heavy over her prey's chest to keep it pinned. They're staring at her - the people in white, the creatures (though most of the latter are taking this moment to get the heck out of Dodge). They're staring, with varying expressions of grief, shock, horror, and fury.
"Katya?" The smallest asks soft and low, and Katya blinks because she knows that shock of dirty blonde hair, cut short and dyed at the ends despite her mentor's best attempts at monitoring her. But it's quickly hidden from sight as the others close rank ahead of the child, defenses to the fore. She can feel the menace hidden in the hands of the man with the intellectual face (Garik, drinking and arguing fiercely in her library while they hid from the summer heat), she can see naked fury on the face of the man built like a male model (Ignat, exclaiming in despair over the state of her hair), she can feel the burn from the curses leveled at her from the stocky man in the center (Seymon, laughing uproariously as she went toe-to-toe with him, all frizz and spark and not older than fourteen, trying to defend her chosen street name and failing horribly).
The fur melts away and she rises, suddenly realizing that the buildings around her are as familiar as her bangles, which she knows better than her hands (back or front) - her hands change, her bangles never have. Home. She's home, she's home, these are her people, her watch, she's home. She takes a step forward, beaming, and is knocked fiercely back on her ass by a wall of cold, summoned by Seymon's abrupt gesture. She opens her mouth to protest, but he's too quick, cutting her off.
"Begone, shade of the past - you are not called or summoned, and have no cause here." The words cut, his expression crushes. There is no welcome there, no hope, no joy. She scrambles to find her feet again, because she will not be sent away so easily, they may doubt but she will take her rightful place back.
Or, at least, that was her plan... before all three gesture, and she recognizes it a second too late, the icy-cold breath of the Gloom suddenly cutting through her protection, the buildings wavering through watering eyes. She shields herself without thought, her hands and arms raised in front of her face in a quick sweeping gesture.
And when she lowers her arms, she is alone. Alone, in the center of an unfamiliar square, staring at signs in English and the trappings of American culture. When she returns to the abandoned loft they have nested in, she brings with her vodka and pastries that are just a little too sweet for her tastes and a little too dry for his, and when she does not explain, he is still there, more real than the memories she cannot explain.
