theresnodoor | (no subject)

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(no subject)

When you fight for three years, you get used to the aspects of it. The secret keeping. The sudden pounding rush of adrenaline. The constant thrum of fear under your skin. The exhaustion. The rage. The helplessness and the power.

There are different kinds of 'get used to,' though.

There's the kind where, free of those constraints, you can relax. It never leaves entirely, but it ebbs. You don't miss it exactly but you recognize that you could go back to it in a heartbeat, if you needed to - and you tell yourself you don't want to.

There's another kind. Less readily admitted to.

The kind where you relax immediately. And slowly, surely, the thrum under your skin comes back. But the fear has a different flavor this time around, more restless than anything else.

The nice thing is, the solution is obvious.

The bad thing is, it's a solution you can't admit to.

Rachel does a lot of things to channel that thrum. Waking at dawn. Gymnastics routines. Runs around the lake. Training with the punching bag. Reading with Tobias. Talking, talking, talking to people. Morphing for fun.

But they're only channels, and none of them for much purpose.

There's only one thing that's given her true relaxation, release, since Milliways.

An afternoon walk in Milliways' forest and Rachel finds herself standing before a tall rock face, more than a hill but not quite a mountain. An opening several feet taller than she is - a rock cave.

Carved into the stone, a symbol she won't readily forget.

"...Daedalus."

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Rachel glares back, not at all tolerant. "Totally not convinced that you're trying to be reassuring."

She's also going to stay a few steps back.

There's a rush of sound above them - birds chirping. But Rachel tenses all the same, chin lifted to watch them pass in a rush of shadow and chatter.

"I don't do reassuring," Mel says bluntly.

She lifts her head and watches the birds above, scratching at the ridiculously itchy patch of remaining sucker spots on her neck.

"Pick a direction. I'm up for not seeing if these are nice birds."

"Sparrows," Rachel corrects, off-hand. They made noise first, so she assumes they're the threat.

That was before something near their feet chirped.

Mel looks down at the adorable little bunny like thing, and proceeds to ignore it.

Nothing smaller that her foot is a threat, right.

Looking around, she nominates directly opposite the door that is now missing, and strides off.

Mel has never met a Helmacron.

Rachel frowns after her striding-danger-partner, then looks at the little creature again. It is tiny and adorable, with big ears for its body and a fluffy neck that makes it look like it's wearing a scarf.

And it chirps again.

She steps around it carefully, ready to follow Mel. The birds were sudden, but so was this - and it's weird. Rachel's more worried about it.

Maybe smart, since it chirps even louder when she moves, it's large dark eyes narrowing.

Mel might be striding.

Rachel just let out a screech and fell back against the trees.

Mel spins around suddenly, one-eighty, scythe out in her hand before she can even think about it.

"Rachel?"

The girl is sprawled back on the ground, stretched out against tree roots. Staring at her arm in utter horror.

The little chirping creature is nowhere to be seen.

And there is a lump beneath Rachel's skin that is climbing, determinedly from her wrist up.

Rachel is not screaming anymore. But she is pale.

Even as her nails start to grow, long and black.

"Rutting hell."

Mel rushes forward, dropping her scythe but grabbing a switchblade from one of her pockets.

"Stay still."

Coming at someone with a blade. That's a perfect way to get them to not panic.

Just perfect. Equally perfect is Rachel's reaction.

Sharp teeth in a human mouth, eyes black and reflective. She may have tried to shout but what comes out when her gaze snaps to Mel is a sharp roar.

And the lump in her arm is climbing higher, scrabbling determinedly up to her bicep, darting to the side, and Rachel knows it's aiming for her chest.

Her nails - long, black - and another moment later, sharp enough.

Blood drips off her arm when she stabs the claws in and another roar rips through her throat - not the discomfort and fear of the creature, but pain when she goes too deep, past the skin, cutting muscle.

Her hand jerks, throwing the creature out of her, tearing her bicep open further.

And the cute, fuzzy creature goes flying toward Mel.

Mel whips her knife hand right up, and impales the thing on her switchblade. There's a scream and a squelch, and she shakes it off, sending the bloody body flying into the grass.

And she skids to a halt,, flicking the blade back into place, in front of the half-girl, half-bear.

She looks from wound to face, Mel's own expression blank and not yet concerned.

"You OK?"

Rachel is pale. Panting. Slowly concentrating to melt her half-bear body back into small, slender human.

She presses one hand to her upper arm, red beading up between her fingers, and looks over at Mel.

She has proper vocal chords now. It's just that snarling is a much better response here.

"That is more like the Labyrinth I remember," she growls.

"More like what I was expecting," Mel says.

She finds a - well, actually it's not a handkerchief, but an actual small bandage that she keeps for this actual purpose - and rips it out of the wrapping with her teeth - handing it to Rachel.

"Best I got. Let's keep moving."

She could morph, demorph. See if that healed her. It might, which would get rid of the pain as well as the blood.

It would tire her out again, too. She's doing all right, but if this is the Labyrinth's cue to make it harder on them, she won't tempt it.

Wrapping a bandage around her bicep one-handed isn't graceful, or terribly efficient. But it gets done before she pushes up to her feet.

And abruptly sets a hand against the nearest tree, blinking rapidly.

Between the shock and the bloodless, she'll need a moment.

Mel, for all her 'keep moving' hardline, has time for needed moments. She walks over to where she discarded her scythe, and carries it back, stopping once to glance down into the grass and stab another baby rabbit before it even has a chance to notice her.

She steps it off the wood into the soil without a word.

Rachel watches this happen, scowling at the little creature. But it gives her the time she needed to get her breathing back under control. Stop seeing double, too.

"I'm good," she says after a moment, more a promise than a statement. Pushing off from the tree, she walks over to Mel, still holding one hand pressed to her bicep.

"Alright."

Mel nods, and glances around. Seeing no obvious place to walk to, she starts off in the same direction. Not rushed, but alert, and determined not to waste any time.

She does not want to cut a thing out of herself.

Mel is really pretty wise.

Rachel follows, pressure on her arm and footsteps steadier by the moment. And eyes? Very sharp on the ground ahead. She doesn't want to watch Mel cut one out, and is pretty sure one hole in her body is enough for now.

So they're quiet for a stretch, then. Both kind of grossed out, both super alert for beasties.

Of course, Mel's a city girl, so she has no idea how to monitor the rest of this... green stuff.

As it changes, one leaf at a time.

They're out of the forest and thick into a humid jungle long before Rachel lifts her eyes enough to notice.

Then, irritably: "Oh, damn it."

Hadn't even noticed that door.

"Huh?"

Mel glances over at Rachel, wiping sweat from her forehead at the same time, and wonders what is up.

Of course, the glances is all she needs, and she looks up and around the new surroundings.

"Jesu."

She can tell when she turns into Helkit from Versi, but she can't tell when an forest is changing entire ecosystems.

Stupid nature.

Nature should be bulldozed and a mall built in its place.

"Just keep an eye out," Rachel advises, frowning as she catches up with Mel.

It is ridiculously hard to look down, up, around, and backwards all at once. But Rachel's arm hurts and she's really quite annoyed about it.

"Already on that," Mel tells her. When they're together again, she heads off in the same direction, one hand tense against the scythe by her side.

Is vampires to much to ask?

Of course.

In fact, the first new creature to appear in front of them is probably very nearly missed.

A fuzzy brown caterpillar is making its way slowly but determinedly right across Mel's path.

Mel is looking up, when she passes it.

And by 'passes', we mean, puts her boot directly down on top of the thing.

The result is a rather quiet squish that goes entirely unnoticed.

Time passes, a handful of minutes, not quite ten. Enough for the silence and lack of anything attacking them to be more nerve-wracking than calming.

It's possible there are more squishes as well.

The jungle around them is getting thicker, less of a path under their feet and more undergrowth. Branches lie in their way, to be ducked under, pushed out of the way. Rachel brushes irritably at leaves that tangle themselves in her hair, while a leaf that brushes Mel's shoulder leaves a soft weight on her skin.

Caterpillar #2 will avenge his brother by... sitting there calmly and not actually doing much.