[ prp ] witness the famine boys ( lurks & mahir & medea?! )

[its me debz]

Lurks Beneath was doing what he always did while in the tower. He called it exploring, but that was absolutely a lie.

It was snooping.

He had clawed open a heavy door, prying it back to reveal a room that smelled something of incense and boring things that Sindri talked about, death and rituals and things that never failed to put Lurks right to sleep, like a little baby, which was maybe why Sindri talked about it all so much.

A sound came from behind him, sending the Famine two feet in the air with a jump and flutter of his wings, his wide, orange eyes somehow widening further.

"Hello," he said, not at all concerned about being caught, a stolen trinket still in hand.

zxoobey

 

[Zoobey]

The room was covered in pillows, and where the pillows ended, there were only mounds of foxfires. Somewhere in the mound of pillows was Medea, but she was too busy staring into a mirror, rather intently, to notice Lurks at all.

lurks beneath

 

[its me debz]

Lurks blinked a few times, glad that whoever had thought about entering had decided to change their mind. He went back to throwing things around to see what was under them. It seemed to alternate: foxfire, pillow, pillow, foxfire, foxfire. And yet they seemed nearly infinite. For every one that Lurks threw, two seemed to appear.

He took a seat on a pillow, sadly holding a foxfire, before deciding to try and eat it in one bite, much to the foxfire's protest: it began screeching and wailing, like only a minipet could do.

"Shut up!" Lurks scolded through a mouthful of fur, but unfortunately, it came out more like so: "Mmph mhp!"

Zoobey

 

[Zoobey]

A hand forcibly pulled the foxfire out of Lurk's reach.

"Child," said Medea, somewhere between exasperated and annoyed, "everything here is sacred. Have you come to make an offering instead of taking one?"

lurks beneath

 

[its me debz]

Lurks went scrambling after the foxfire, his bony little hands trying to grab it back, a rasping whine emanating from his throat. It's not like the thing had tasted good-- it hadn't-- or that it was special-- it wasn't--

It was just that, well.

He really didn't like being told he couldn't do something.

"That is not sacred," he said, as if Medea were the one that was very stupid and slow, and not the very obvious other way around. "I want it. Offerings are boring and rituals are too." And then, sulkily, "You are not Mother."

zoobey

 

[Zoobey]

"No," Medea confirmed, but she shifted anyway, allowing him to sit next to her, bribing him with something red and glinting in her hands. Sparkling. Shiny. A fragment of something perhaps. "I am not mother, and I do not hold by her beliefs, but instead, she by mine." It was obvious what she was saying, but perhaps a little difficult for Lurks to understand.

"What purpose then do you have here, little stray? If it is power you seek, you will need to become something far greater."

astaraeI

 

[its me debz]

Lurks took the bait, coveting the crystal with greedy little hands, biting down on it with his exposed teeth, as if checking that it was, in fact, a nice rock.

(It was a nice rock, and tasted like something sparking against his teeth.)

"I see," Lurks said, and he did not see at all. "I want to become the biggest and the bestest," he offered, "I want them to witness."

zoobey

astaraei

 

[Molten Tigrex]

There was a soft rustle and one of the larger masses of roving foxfires suddenly disassembled to reveal another famine horseman, this one also attempting to make off with one of Medea's sacred animals. The newcomer was quick to draw their many shadowy arms behind their back, doing a downright terrible job of hiding a variety of brightly colored potion vials.

The foxfire under their arm wriggled and hiccuped a small orange and green fireball, setting a pillow alight.

"I did not ask for a witnesss," Mahir immediately deflected, pointing at Lurks with a potion-laden shadowhand, "He did."  

[Zoobey]

"Good," continued Medea, "if you both become the best and brightest, then I will give you both these."

She held out two stuffed foxfires she had made out of yarn and needlepoint and an excessive amount of patience. They were clearly, made of yarn and buttons, though it was questionable if either Lurks or Mahir could tell the difference between them and actual foxfires. If this had been Shaheen, she probably would have walked out of the room by now, never to be seen again.

"Now, tell me what kind of power you both desire."

astaraeI

lurks beneath

 

[its me debz]

Lurks' wings flew up behind him, much like how a foxfire got even more fluffy when it was angry. "You are a traitor!" he whined, throwing a pillow-- but, notably, not the shiny rock-- at Mahir.

His tantrum in the making quieted down at the sight of a stuffed foxfire that could be his-- ALL HIS-- for doing more of what...well. Lurks was always the best and brightest, so he should get it very swiftly.

Instead, Lurks hugged (another) pillow and kicked his feet a little.

"I want a lair, and I want to have humans, and I want to have a farm, and I want to have stable sources of FEAR for myself and maybe Sindri and my brother, but I don't really like sharing so they might need to bring their own humans to keep, because mine will be MINE and I don't want to share--"

it went on and on for a bit.

astaraeI

zoobey

 

[Molten Tigrex]

Mahir's yellow eyes immediately went wide and catlike. The allure of a strange new artifical foxfire was enough to instantly and completely distract the other famine horseman. Mahir took the pillow squarely to the face and immediately began to sink in a Titanic-esque fashion back into the sea of more pillows as Lurks rattled off his halloween list --

-- and resurfaced again much closer to the prize (and Medea), creeping like a water-bug on so many thin and spindly arms. He didn't exactly wait for Lurks to finish talking, merely adding to the cacophany.

"I am looking," Mahir pantomimed, pulling on his eyelids, "For a remedy, to disease with no cure. They say it cannot be done but I do not lisssten."

He glanced over his shoulder at Lurks, who was still going on about something that could have been moths, or rocks, or hawks. He shifted his shoulders sheepishly under the heavy red robes. "Alssso I would like Mengyao to be my friend forever."

zoobey

 

[Zoobey]

"All very valid desires-" Medea finally cut off the rest of Lurk's babbling, "and they are all within your capabilities if you were something greater. A new star has fallen from the sky, and with it comes endless power. The power of destruction."

She materialized in her hand a red butterfly that floated around for a bit before dissolving again. An illusion. "Find them for me, the sigils of destruction, and I will greatly reward you. All that you desire, all that you may gain, their paths will open for you."

AstaraeI

lurks beneath

 

[its me debz]

"Boring," Lurks whispered to Mahir with a dramatic roll of the eyes, before his attention snapped back to Medea. "I like stars," Lurks said, touching the starry pin that the Star Walker had given him in an absentminded sort of way.

He tried to grab and paw at the butterfly-- like one of his own moths, wispy and incorporeal, but the reddest ruby he'd ever seen, like fresh blood on bone-white sand, and-- it was gone.

"Where?" Lurks asked, smiling in a way that showed all thirty-two of his teeth.

zoobey

astaraei

 

[Molten Tigrex]

Mahir glanced at Lurks and giggled behind several shadowy hands. There was something perhaps unimpressive about the idea of a butterfly, to someone so well acquainted with the majority of the insect kingdom. Also, Mahir did not know how to whisper - it was something he had only recently picked up from Mengyao and he assumed that so long as you were facing someone else and making a very haughty face, no one else could hear you. "She can keep the butterfliesss - more antsss and locustsss and roachesss for usss. Butterfliesss tassste terrible."

He then smiled attentively at Medea again as if she could not possibly have heard his bizarre conspiratory plotting and bounced excitedly on the pillow he had staked out. "How?"

xzoobey

xlurks beneath

 

[Zoobey]

"A moment, if you will." Medea took out the mirror she was looking at and oddly enough, snapped off a fragment of its already broken facet. She threw it into the pyre, the continuous pyre she always burned in her lair, and everything around them dropped and shifted.

For a moment both Mahir and Lurks Beneath were on the battlefield. The skies were a deep red, as was the sand, covered in pools of blood. Human blood, their recently deceased Fear washing off them in palatable droves, creating a euphoric sense of power. Prisoners, the filth called Hunters, were being caged, marched away. Others begged them, pleaded for mercy, their noises pleasant, exciting, exhilarating. Fear at the highest.

For Mahir he saw himself as a Sage, and he saw himself respected by all of Famine. He saw him create creatures beyond even his own unlimitless imagination, creatures magnificent, both insect and abomination. For Lurks Beneath, he saw his collection become infinite, as skeletons and bodies and trinkets gathered at his feet beyond where his eye could see. He saw his Lair encompass large territories until all paid homage to him, until all acknowledged him as leader as well.

The vision faded. They were back. "The sigil of Destruction," Medea continued, "it will bring you this fate. This mirror does not show possibilities, it shows inevitability. This power is yours. Find the sigils, claim your destinies."

The pyre flared again and showed a Hunter, female, most likely. "Find me this Hunter, for she has the tome, the first of the sigils. If she is dead or alive it doesn't matter, what mattes is the tome. Use these crystals to disguise yourself as Hunters, and go to the island. When you have found her, bring her outside of the fortress, far far outside, then shatter the crystals, and she and you will be returned to me."

To each Medea handed them red crystals. Shinies perhaps. They were beautiful to behold on their own, but with their power, after what they had seen, they could obtain so much more. The pyre now formed a gate. It was their calling. Valhalla was waiting.

astaraeI

Lurks and Mahir can now infiltrate Deus. When they are there, as long as they are holding the crystals given, they look like Hunters (you can make up a RANDOM look, they shouldn't look like any existing ones). They will still speak the same, but their appearance will be entirely changed. This guise is only able to fool Hunters at Full Hunter rank or lower.

THEY CAN BASICALLY WANDER AROUND DEUS UNTIL THEY FIND MIMSY IN PRPS ON DEUS. When they shatter the crystal, it will bring everyone back. Also a note, that it only works if Mimsy is convinced outside of Deus HQ (light at the lighthouse or beach or something).

lurks beneath

Lurks and Mahir can now infiltrate Deus. When they are there, as long as they are holding the crystals given, they look like Hunters (you can make up a RANDOM look, they shouldn't look like any existing ones). They will still speak the same, but their appearance will be entirely changed. This guise is only able to fool Hunters at Full Hunter rank or lower.

THEY CAN BASICALLY WANDER AROUND DEUS UNTIL THEY FIND MIMSY IN PRPS ON DEUS. When they shatter the crystal, it will bring everyone back. Also a note, that it only works if Mimsy is convinced outside of Deus HQ (light at the lighthouse or beach or something).

nothing yet

quoting so you can see what's up!