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anip-ocs · 5 years

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Location: Town Plaza, Kihiro City, California, United States

Time: Sunday, March 29th, 3:18 P.M.

Compared to other monsters they'd fought before, this one was acting relatively docile... for now. Which probably just made it even more terrifying by that aspect alone.

Disillusions stood huddled in an alleyway, observing it. Whatever the monster had been doing before to initiate the warning ping, it had stopped. Maybe it was because there was no one on the streets anymore? All they knew is that they'd come onto the scene and it was eerily quiet.

The monster perched atop the fountain. At least, they presumed it was the monster. It was a bird--a black crow, just sitting atop of the bow of Eros, out of reach of the spray of the little cherubs spewing water in arcs around the Greek God. It was unmoving, and it's eyes seemed to be closed as well. But nothing else was on the street, nor was there any slight indication that the monster had actually moved to someplace else.

"What are we gonna do about it?" Brian asked, giving it another wary glance.

Ken looked at it a second before looking away, looking more than a little bit unsettled. "I don't think that's a normal bird."

"But what if it is?" Maddi asked.

"Doesn't smell like the birds that are in the forest usually." Claw mumbles, looking over at everyone. "So no, I don't think it is either."

"So then, why isn't it wrecking shit already?" CJ asked. "If it's a monster, then wouldn't it be hellbent on doing that?"

"Maybe it's waiting for something." Jay said with a shrug.

"Like what?" Taylor asked. "Us?"

"Probably."

"But we're here. Why isn't it doing anything yet?"

"I'm not sure, but we should probably go attack it while we have the chance." Ken said, standing straight and reaching for his swords. Alana put a hand on his arm before he could rush out.

"It could be a trap, Ken. I'll go." she said.

"Why you?"

"Because you're terrified of this thing, and I can sneak over and be way smaller so I won't get noticed."

"But what if it--"

"Attacks me? We risk that no matter what. I'll go up, and then pin it and then we'll figure out what it's up to. Okay?"

"I think it’s a good idea!" Claw grins. "And if anything goes wrong, we're here to assist."

"Yeah! I'll be fine." before anyone could protest further, Alana shifted forms into a chickadee and flew out of the alleyway, making her way to the back side of the corvid. It didn't even seem to notice, didn't even shift. She landed on the edge of the fountain behind the bird, shifted forms, and reached out to grab it.

Before she could, it opened its eyes--eight of them, pupil less and red, and turned to face her with a screeching caw that grated at all of their ears and left their heads reeling. By the time anyone was even mildly ready to react and attack the beast, it was as tall as the fountain and had Alana pinned under its talons, one sunk deep into her shoulder.

"Hey! Let go of her!" Ken shouted, but found himself paralyzed to the spot. The rest of the team rushed out to try and help her, leaping into action. Maddi tried to send out a plume of flame its way, but the beast flared out its wings--eight wings--and a flurry of arrows rained down on the group. Claw was hit in the leg, CJ earning a slice in the arm for his efforts to run and defend him. Brian cast out a hand, and a nearby car zoomed over to block them, separating the team from the beast, who still had their friend pinned. When the hail of arrows ended and the bird redirected its attention--and beak--to Alana, the car became surrounded in a blue glow and floated in the air a moment before being sent hurtling towards it. Before it could hit, it was sliced in half by a wing, and the following shots from Brian's gun seemed to do little to nothing more than irritate it.

No one else could even get any other attacks in before it fully grasped Alana in its talons and flew away, with another horrendous caw that seemed to rock the foundations of the buildings around them. Alana couldn't do much of anything more than reach out for them, vines desperately uprooting themselves from the earth to try and ensnare the corvid with no success. CJ tried to get into the air and go after them, but with another screech he let out a scream and plummeted to the ground.

"A-Are you guys okay?!" Ken called out, finding himself able to move again and rushing to their sides. Maddi turned and sent him a glare.

"Why weren't you helping?!"

"I-I panicked, I couldn't move, I--"

"Damn good time to panic! Ala--Bio's gone, Darky! What are we gonna do now?!"

"We could go after her instead of trying to start arguments?" Jay suggested with a flick of an ear. "Which way did they go? The faster we can get there, the more likely we're able to prevent anything worse from occurring."

"Jay has a point, guys." Taylor says, taking the Vastian's hand. "Let's get going." at that, the whole team set out to find their kidnapped friend. Hoping that nothing was happening she wouldn't be able to handle.

Location: Sanders Household/The Puppeteer's Base of Operations, Kihiro City, California, United States

Time: Sunday, March 29th. 3:30 P.M.

Alana was already pretty terrified the instant the monster turned and pinned her, and it only heightened once it took flight and whisked her away from her friends to who knows where. But as she started recognizing gated communities and roads her mother would have to drive through in order to get to the house of an old friend, her anxieties turned into irritation.

Of course, Will was at the bottom of this! For a moment, she'd worried that this monster was made by Zarroff--he was pretty determined to make man into beast, and she'd feared he'd figured it out. But no, it was just the Puppeteer again.

Was the Puppeteer still technically a threat? Yes, of course. Was the Puppeteer a coward who hid behind his magic book, had no real combat skills, and almost a full half a head shorter than her? Yes. All she had to do was make sure he didn't get a chance to crack open his book, and she could hold out until her friends got here--or even beat him herself.

The giant demon bird--that was two now, Will--touched down in the Sanders Household's backyard, immediately shrinking in size as it flew to perch on the back of a lawn chair. The pool was behind her, the chair and the irritating twig of a boy who'd decided to kidnap her in front. The book sat in his lap, the pencil in his hand, but he wasn't too interested in sketching her as it seemed. Instead he looked up at her, lowering his sunglasses to reveal his real glasses and... honestly, one of the more disturbing things today was that look on his face.

"At long last," he grinned, sitting up fully. "You're all mine."

"Uh. No, not really." Alana muttered, rubbing at the talon scratches across her arm. It hurt immensely to even try and move her right arm, nor was she willing to strain it until her shoulder healed. She wasn't a fan of the sticky feeling of blood, nor the boy who'd caused it.

"Oh, but that's where you're wrong, my love." now he was standing up, taking slow gliding steps towards her. Was he trying to be impressive? Right now, he was just annoying, and had her good shoulder not had a hole in it, she might've punched him in the face. "You don't have to pretend anymore, Alana. Your 'friends' aren't here to manipulate you! You can be yourself, we can be together!"

"How many times do I have to tell you that I do not want to be with you?"

"But you only said that because your friends were manipulating you!"

"No, Will. If anyone here is being manipulative, its you. You literally mind control people, and you think my friends are the ones who are being manipulative?!"

Will's smile shifted into a frown, and Alana unwillingly felt herself shudder. Goddamn shoulder, would you heal already?! "Alana. Together, we will be king and queen of this world. I can be king as is. If you need some... persuasion to be my queen, then so be it." he reached for the collar of his shirt and... started unbuttoning it. With every button, he took a small step forward, and Alana reciprocated by taking a step back. Eventually, the shirt was unbuttoned fully, and Will was standing there as if he was presenting something impressive. "Well? What do you think?"

"I think I want to go home." Alana rolled her eyes, but a glance down showed she was almost at the edge of the pool. One more step back and she'd fall into the water, and it wasn't like she'd be able to swim with her dumb arm still being injured. "Will, you can literally stop being a villain whenever you want. Just accept that I am not into you and let us move on with our lives."

"You'll learn to love me soon enough."

"Uh, no, Will, I won't--"

"Here, let me show you how," he took more steps forward, but before Alana could think about sidestepping to avoid him, the crow flew off of his shoulder and grew in size, just enough to block her way out. It made a sort of caw, and her head started to hurt too bad to even really see. By the time the spots were out of her eyes and her skin stopped crawling, she realized Will had grabbed her by the waist and was trying to tilt her chin towards him for a kiss. And then her skin began to crawl again.

Alana shoved out with her arms--her right shoulder began to bleed anew, but she didn't care as much at the moment--to get Will off of her, and stepped backwards, perfectly expecting to feel water start to flood over her. But she didn't get that--instead she got more solid surface to stand on. What? She looked down, and a giant lotus flower had bloomed beneath her, keeping her afloat upon its petals. When she looked back up, Will was lunging for her. Another shove, which wrenched him away and pushed her flower further towards the other side of the pool. He'd torn her shirt a bit, he'd grabbed her so hard. Her whole shoulder was beginning to throb with immense pain, and she clutched at it to try and stop the bleeding. What was in there, what was keeping it from healing?!

Will was occupying himself by taking pictures, but he was frowning. And then he began to make his way back to his lawn chair, to his book and pencil. "I tried to give you a choice, Alana, but now you leave me without one."

"Or you could stop being an asshole! What's your fucking problem!?"

"What can I say? I can't control myself when it comes to you." he was opening the book, flipping through the pages one by one. It was like torture, her heart was beating in her chest, but she wasn't sure she could even manage to shift into anything right now, let alone maneuver in that form well enough to escape in time.

"You can control yourself. You're just choosing not to." she sent him a toxic glare, but he laughed it off.

"You'll see things my way soon. Take a pose, sweetheart."

"Hey!" the two turned to see Claw standing there, the rest of the team behind him. He tapped his wrists and the clawed gauntlets appeared in a flash of red light. "Let her go."

"Coming to crash the party?" Will sounded frustrated, but then a malicious smirk crossed his face as he thrust out his hand. "Be my guest!"

The mutant crow once again began to swell, towering over the team. Ken's eyes widened in horror, his hands shaking as he drew his blade to fight the best he could.

A screeching caw from the creature shattered their resolve, and their focus, and before anyone was anywhere near ready to react, the bird was flying at them with a vengeance. Its talons were outstretched, and it pinned Taylor to the ground and knocked the wind out of her. She let out a scream as it bent to try and peck at her, but before it could a fireball flew into its mouth, and shortly after it was stabbed by Claw's gauntlets.

Will was just about to begin to draw something else when he heard CJ calling for Alana to jump. He and Brian were at the other edge of the pool, urging their teammate to jump to them. He couldn't have that, now could he?

The two boys stopped and turned to see that a snake-headed crocodile was behind them, letting out a hiss of a growl and targeting their ankles. It was a dark green, almost black, but with dangerous looking red spots along its back and at the tips of its fangs and teeth.

"Whoa! Scoot over!" Brian shouted, launching himself onto the leaves of the lotus flower. CJ quickly followed suit, but just as they were thinking they were safe, the beast slipped into the water and began circling around them. Oh fuck.

The others were a bit too occupied to help them, which wasn't necessarily their fault. The bird monster was still on top of Taylor, arrows shooting out of its wings at their friends. Jay had managed to form a shield large enough to protect three people, but Ken was still in the midst of the firefight. His own wings furled out of his back, and he flew at the monster with his swords and a battle cry. The two collided, Ken trying to slash through the monster's thick feathers with one sword while precariously holding back it's razor sharp beak with the other. Another caw sent their heads spinning, and the bird hopped off of Taylor to snap down on Ken's arm and shake him around. He let out a cry of pain, another following as Maddi attempted to hit the monster with her fire but instead hit his wing. Taylor thrust out her hands, summoning rocks to strike the beast in the side of the head and causing it to stumble to the side. The beast tumbled into the pool with a splash, Ken being pulled in with it.

The crocodile monster redirected its attention towards the giant splash, having already been on the leaves of the flower and about to climb over the petals into the center, but deciding to launch back into the water and go after whatever caused the disturbance. The three teens within the flower relaxed a bit, but weren't quite ready to leave the flower yet either.

Maddi almost launched herself into the water, but Claw stopped her, wincing a bit as he strained his leg to do so. "Wait! Don't!"

"What?! Why not?!" she groaned.

"Fire powers and water? No, that's not happening. Let's get Alana and them and--where's the Puppet boy?"

"Over there!" Taylor pointed towards the house, where Will was about to duck inside to supposed safety. The three chased after him, while Jay did his best to help the other three off of the flower.

Maddi, Taylor, and Claw raced into the Sanders Household, only to be stopped by Will's parents. The two servants lunged at them, his mother grabbing Claw and pinning him down and throwing punches while his father went for Taylor. He grabbed her arm before Maddi punched him in the neck, causing him to stumble back and let go of her friend. Claw was struggling to get up, mainly because Mrs. Sanders had relented to pulling at his ears as hard as she could muster, which was really damn hard when considering all of her normal inhibitions had vanished under the control of a madman.

Maddi and Taylor ran to go help him, but the cupboards began to tremble, slowly at first but then violently as a horde of black salamander-like creatures burst out of them and raced their way. While one of them wouldn't be too much to handle, hundreds and maybe even thousands of them was a bit too much, especially considering their footpads seemed to seep toxins into their skin that made them get too tired to keep fighting and resisting. Odd thoughts started filling their heads, thoughts none of them liked or even wanted to be hearing, but as the creatures overtook them, ignoring them became less and less of an option.

When he and the bird crashed beneath the surface, the monster let go of his arm with a gasp and tried to fly to the surface. Ken held his breath and thrust out his hands, and the surface of the water began to freeze over, trapping the bird underwater with him. Now it was a waiting game--who'd break through first, who'd drown first? He snapped his wings to propel him forward under the surface, striking at the bird with his blade. A gash of purple blood clouded out of the wound, but it wasn't fully down for the count quite yet.

Before Ken could go in for another attack, something bit down into his leg, causing him to cry out before he could think not to. Immediately his lungs began to fill with water, burning, but the new offending monster just thrashed about, as if it were trying to rip his leg right off of him. He barely managed to wrench it away, desperately trying to swim up and break the surface of the ice so he could catch his breath. Luckily, this was ice of his own will, and it broke easily enough for him to pop his head out of the new hole and catch a breath.

"Ken! What's going on in there?!" Alana gasped, eyes wide as she hopped off a giant flower atop the ice to run over. Her friend coughed out some water, but was unable to get any words out before he was suddenly pulled back into the water, desperately clawing at the ice to no avail.

"Dude?!" CJ shouted, running over to the hole with his friends beside him. There were three dark shapes under the ice, one large and desperately trying to peck through the ice, but the other two were smaller. One swam to the surface, but it swam too fishlike to be their friend. Indeed, the snake-odile surged up and nearly bit CJ's face off with a hiss. Brian formed a blade of metal and swung at it, but before it could connect, the beast dipped back under the ice. The two shapes began tussling again, the large demon bird fading away into nothing after it had sat still for far too long.

"Should we go help him?" Brian asked, looking to his friends.

"I can swim, but not well enough for that, I don't think." CJ said. "Now, I could try and make a bubble around me, but I don't know how well I could attack like that."

"I don't think I can even shift forms right now. My shoulder won't--oh? Oh, its healing now. Give me a second, then we can talk." Alana said, rubbing her shoulder.

Before anything else could be said, Ken's head popped out of the hole, and CJ and Brian lifted him by the shoulders onto the ice. An instant later, the final monster burst out of the ice, launching itself onto the surface. It came after them, its claws causing it to skid along the icy surface, but it was still moving formidably fast. Ken finished coughing and turned to face the beast, a sword held in front of him as he stood in place umoving.

"We're ending this!" He shouted, glaring down the reptilian monster. It launched into the air to attack him, but he stabbed through it's underbelly with his sword, the tip of the blade piercing through it's leather back, and he took his other blade and sliced it's head off it's form with one fluid motion and a spattering arc of violet blood. Only then did he let the fallen beast slide off his blade and onto the ice, where it then faded into nothingness.

"That looked so cool!!" CJ shouted, eyes wide.

"I wouldn't know anything," Jay said, causing everyone to turn and see him with his arms crossed over his chest. "Ken, with all due respect, I'm not sure what exactly I'm expected to do in a battle scenario like this, let alone why you brought me."

"Well... We could use your healing assistance." Ken offered.

"What about your telekinesis?" Brian asked. "You have that, don't you?"

"Yes, but I don't use it for much more than shields. I didn't really see a reason to train it any further. I can't really aim any attacks, could I?" Jay said, his tail flicking to and fro. "Is everyone alright, by the way? I know Alana's healing powers are faster than mine, but I can still assist."

"Honestly, I had a hole in my shoulder for a good fifteen-twenty minutes, and it's taking a bit longer than usual to heal up. I'm not even close to halfway done." Alana said. "And Ken has some damage on his arm, leg, and wing, so if you want to help him with that, you can."

"Alright! And if CJ and Brian are alright, then the rest of the team went inside a house or something."

"Oh, yeah! Let's go!" the two boys raced inside to assist their friends in hopefully bringing down the Puppeteer and his plots.

Brian and CJ opened the door to the house, and near-immediately a stream of black salamanders poured out, scattering into the world beyond the Sanders' yard. The inside of the house was dark, pale light seeping through as it shone through the bodies of salamanders sticking to the light. Asides from that, no one seemed to be around.

"Uh? Guys?" CJ called out. "Hewwoooo??"

"Maybe they're upstairs," Brian said, stepping further into the door to find the stairwell. Almost immediately, he was grabbed by a hand and slammed onto the tile floors of the kitchen, the force of impact nearly cracking them. Maddi had him pinned, one hand around his throat and the other about to cast a fire attack right onto his face, a knee on his chest. Fortunately, Maddi was pretty short and easy to throw off, but--

"What the fuck, Maddi?!" CJ shouted, only to be grabbed by Taylor and Claw. They seemed to be trying to strangle them, but even in the low light he could tell something was wrong. If the fact that his friends were attacking him wasn't enough of a clue, their eyes were too dark, it was like even the sclera was beginning to turn black. Something had happened. And they needed to snap them out of it.

Something started crawling on Brian's arms, making his skin crawl. He moved to swipe it off, but it just stuck to his hand, and then Maddi slammed him into the counters with bared teeth, trying to hold him still for... some reason... was that a salamander on her neck? And there were a few on her arms too, pressed down like tattoos, nearly flat against her skin. And the one on his arm was quickly being joined by many others, and the more they moved around the dizzier and dizzier he got. Serve the Puppeteer. What? No way that thought was his!

Wait a second.

"CJ! Get them outside!" Brian shouted, gesturing the best he could towards the door. CJ couldn't even properly see it because he'd been pinned on the ground, the blades of Claw's gauntlets hovering dangerously close to his neck.

"Uh, don't think that's an option right now!" he yelled, eyes wide and focused on the knife points.

"We need to!" Maddi tried to pin him more, but he kicked her in the gut to get her back before he pushed off of the counter and ran for the door, the girl giving chase. Taylor tried to block his way, but he just grabbed her arm and dragged her outside as well. Claw looked up at the commotion, distracted, and CJ managed to squirm out from under him and race outside.

The sunlight didn't seem to waver their resolve, the three teammates still chasing after them, but quite frankly Brian had a backup plan that would hopefully help. Ken looked up at the sound of the door slamming against the wall behind it, eyes wide.

"What's going on?!" he asked incredulously, prompting Alana to look up from her shoulder and Jay to stop what he was doing and listen in.

"Un-ice more of the pool!" Brian shouted as he jumped onto the slippery surface and fell on his butt, sliding halfway across the expanse.

"What?! Why?!"

"Just do it!" CJ shouted, leaping onto the surface as well. Ken made a larger hole in the ice just as the rest of their friends launched themselves after them, causing them to fall into the water instead. They let out shouts of shock before climbing out of the water, shaking themselves off as black salamanders slipped off their arms, necks, and legs before scattering into the distance. The instant they were all off, they rubbed their eyes and looked around.

"Since when were we out here again?!" Maddi yelled, spinning in a circle to make sure her eyes weren't tricking her.

"You guys got puppeteed by fucking lizards!" Brian said.

"What?!" the rest of the team exclaimed, eyes wide.

"Lizards?!" Taylor screamed, looking absolutely repulsed. "Oh, ugh, I can't stand lizards, what'd they make us do?!"

"You tried to attack us until you fell in the pool, then they fell off." CJ said. "You guys okay? Not still wanting to kill us, are you?"

"I'll pass on that," Claw said, trying to dry himself off further. "But I'm not really willing to go back into that hellhole again either."

"How'd it happen?" Alana asked, walking up to check them over. Asides from dark marks on their arms, they were okay, and it looked like the marks would go away sooner or later too.

"We went in and his parents attacked us! Then all these sala-shits came out the cabinets, like, thousands of them! Then we were out here!" Maddi huffed.

"That sounds... yeah, you couldn't pay me to go in there right now." Jay said, eyebrows furrowed. "Ken, you should be good to stand."

"Thanks, Jay. So, what are we going to do next?" he asked.

"Will's probably upstairs in his room, laughing his head off at us. And as much as I want to punch that look off his fucking face, I don't want to go back in there either." Maddi grumbled. "I just want to go home. Treehouse is ready now, right?"

"Yeah. I actually got the call a few minutes before this battle happened. You all can come to my house to grab your things and then I'll walk you over."

"Thanks."

"For?"

"Uh, for letting us not go back in there... and for everything else." Maddi's face turned red and she looked away, shoulders hunched. She let out a cough. "I mean, you could have saved your dumb money and done rich people shit with it."

"You're welcome, Maddi." Ken smiled.

"So, we can leave now, right?" Alana asked.

"Yeah. That was more than enough action for the day. We know where his base is, we can attack when we're ready."

With that, the team split off, making their ways home. Being generally sick and tired of Will's bullshit.

The Yakk List: @ravenpuffwriter @dreamswithadashofspice @ejmcmoon @writerofwriting @beeofwriting

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