Sweet Desert Rose, Each Of Her Veils A Secret Promise

[magicdancer]

Who: Shantae and Char
What: Hunting for MASK THIEVES
Where: Around the academy
When: November 16
Warnings: D for DARGONS

They were all running out of time. The last mask had been discovered, but the other three had gone missing, stolen from Gordon's lab during the halloween party. So now they had to recover the missing masks before disaster struck. Shantae had enough of sitting on the sidelines. She had to do something.

She set out into the woods around the academy. Perhaps some monster had snuck into the academy... After all, nobody there had anything to gain from taking the masks, not when they were the key to their salvation. But a rogue monster, that perhaps wanted to ensure their destruction... Well, they had all the reason needed to steal the masks, didn't they? Shantae had no idea. But it was better than doing nothing.

It was rare that she bothered to set out alone into the woods, and they looked far more intimidating up close, she quickly realized. She had to be on her guard. Who knows what might jump out at her...?

Comments

[rivalkidneypunch]

If you were to guess "a fuck-off huge orange dragon," then you would be right.

Shantae was not the only one who preferred action to sitting on their thumbs. Char couldn't possibly keep still with the moon hanging closer and closer over their heads and their salvation yanked right out from under their feet. He was ready to pound whoever took those things into a fine meaty paste.

The problem was in finding them. The woods had been uncomfortably silent and empty once the animals had all fled, so all his circling overhead hadn't offered up even the faintest twitch of movement. At least... until he caught a glimpse of purple out of the corner of his eye. Something human-sized. Right away, Char pulled into a dive, slamming into the ground several feet in front of Shantae, teeth bared and a roar rumbling up from his throat.

[magicdancer]

Shantae was thrown back when the dragon landed, but this wasn't the first fuckoff huge dragon she'd run into before. Although given its sudden arrival and aggressive stance, Shantae believed her suspicions confirmed. "All right! Now we're talking! I figured you'd show your face eventually!"

She dropped into a combat stance, grinning eagerly. "So, you gonna cough up those masks, or do I need to beat 'em out of you?" she challenged.

[rivalkidneypunch]

While it was true that Char was never the kind of guy to turn down a good fight, instead of coming in swinging, he straightened up, big lizardy face looking... kinda confused and vaguely disappointed. No pummeling the fuckwads that had put everyone in this position yet, huh? Just someone out looking for the same thing as him. And here he was expecting to see a little excitement.

With an abrupt, jarring poof, he switched back to his humanized form -- pantomime and dargon-growls weren't something he had the patience for. "Ease up, alright? I don't got the masks. I'm out lookin' for them, same as you are."

[magicdancer]

"Oh! Wait, you're NOT an evil monster out to bring about our doom?" Shantae asked, perhaps a little disappointed that she didn't get to beat up any baddies tonight.

"Er... Sorry about that," she said, loosening up her stance and relaxing. "I've seen you around campus. Shouldn't have jumped the gun like that."

[rivalkidneypunch]

"Last I checked, I ain't." Though you could probably make a convincing argument for the "evil monster" part of that being accurate, at least.

While he wasn't going to apologize himself -- "I'm sorry" were not words Char had gotten any better at over the years -- he did at least relax a little. "Guess I kinda overdid it droppin' down on you like that, anyway," he admitted. "You're the first livin' thing I've seen here so far. This place gives me the creeps ever since just about everything fucked off somewhere."

[magicdancer]

"I get the feeling," Shantae said, hands on her hips. "It's... eerie. You'd think a place like this would be crawling with life. But it's just so... quiet."

She glanced at Char. "Well, if we're both on the same quest, maybe we should work together?" she suggested.

[rivalkidneypunch]

"I ain't really the teamwork type, sweetheart," Char began, but his gaze swept out over the forest. The empty... really empty... kind of boring... forest. Nothing but the howl of late autumn wind and the occasional rattle of a dead leaf.

"...But I guess it'll make things a little more excitin', won't it?" He was forced to admit. "I ain't got even a hint of a scent, really. Not yet, anyway. Just... hell, it's better than doin' nothing but wait."

[magicdancer]

"Then think of it as keeping each other company while we search," Shantae suggested, hands behind her head. "Definitely liven things up."

She nodded in agreement. "Anything is better than sitting around waiting for disaster, and if there's a chance the masks are out here, then I'm all for taking it. We've got plenty of ground to cover though, so let's get this show on the road," Shantae said, starting to walk and fully expecting Char to follow.

[rivalkidneypunch]

Char shoved his hands into his pockets and followed along -- well, no, Char didn't follow anyone but Green. He walked with her. That's what he did.

"...Y'really think they might be out here?" He ventured. "Like, whatever asshole stole 'em mighta stashed them away somewhere?"

[magicdancer]

Good enough for her.

"It's possible," she said. "It's not like they could fence them in town or anything, so the masks have got to be around campus. Maybe the thief is hiding them. Besides, I don't think anyone's checked out here yet, so it's SOMETHING," she added. "I'd rather try looking somewhere and not find them than just sit on my butt all day."

[rivalkidneypunch]

"Yeah, I get that. Too stubborn to be thinkin' we might not make it, but..." Well, might-not-make-it was the kind of thought that Char had faced a couple times before, so it wasn't exactly one he could ignore. He... sort of didn't have any hopes built up that they'd find anything. He sort of didn't expect there to be anything he could really do about the moon blotting out the sky.

But. "Hell, I'll just regret it even more if I don't do nothing, right? A pointless something is better than not doin' shit. Maybe we'll luck out."

[magicdancer]

"That's my hope," Shantae replied. "If I'm going down, I'm going down fighting."

Shantae's eyes were on the path ahead, ducking under branches as they got deeper and deeper into the woods. "It's eerie... So quiet," she said. "Anything living was smart enough to get out of dodge, I guess..."

[rivalkidneypunch]

"Tell me about it. I ain't hunted a damn thing in months." A fact he was more than a little sore about. Nothing wrong with Nancy's food, or with anything out in FDC, but... it'd become sort of a pride point to be able to survive on what his own teeth brought down.

"S'usually a rough time getting any prey in winter, but... hell, makes me glad I ain't completely wild. Even if that moon weren't breathin' down our necks, we'd still be in trouble, y'know?" A kind of bleak thought -- what if the moon stayed right where it was? What if things didn't go back to normal after this was fixed? It was more than a little hard not to be morbid with your imminent death literally hanging overhead, though.

[magicdancer]

"It's true," Shantae said with a nod. "At least we've got plenty of supplies in the academy. But unless something changes soon, even that's gotta run out. Of course, unless we find the masks, it's not like that'll matter too much," she added.

"Not that that's gonna happen. We're gonna find whoever took those masks, and we're gonna kick their butts right up into their faces!"