and it's creeping its way through my windows and it's slithering under my door
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Jun 10, 2016 17:00:42 GMT
Post by eldritch on Jun 10, 2016 17:00:42 GMT
 there’s been a countdown of how much time they have left and it takes the form of three eyes.
one expands on the thenar space of emi’s hand and it makes his thumb hard to bend. red spreading across its yellow sclera draws his attention half-way through the meeting because he thinks he’s bleeding but he’s not. when his thumbpad presses down against the eyeball, it’s dry and rubbery. the colour still runs something close to spitfire which only means one thing: one of his guards is gone and their timer ticks down from three.
so his chair squeaks against the linoleum flooring as he pulls out. people who were looking look away and people who weren’t look. it’s hard to resist the staring match with the extra eye nestled the hollow of his cheek. not so hollow anymore.
“‘scuse me a mo,” a hand moves to the chair beside him. the man sitting in it flinches away unconsciously and emi takes the opportunity to pull off the jacket resting on the back of the man’s chair. just borrowing it, he thinks, as he steps to the door to the back-alley, slipping it on and pulling up the hood. the sleeve has a small tag that says hugo boss.
the alley air is acrid when emi steps outside. that’s his fault. first it’s the smell of tainted sea salt. like down arkham docks where the bodies wash up and seagulls pick at them.
then sulphur prickles through the air. his own vision swims when he sees his second guard lying flat with an arrow in him. this again.
the guard doesn’t stay quite flat for long. it expands, unmoving, like inflating slowly around the arrow. the eye on emi’s wrist swells shut. it leaks a yellow foam which sounds wet against the ground as it drips. it stains.
emi exhales.
“can we talk about this?” he calls out into the alley, approaching and crouching next to the eldritch abomination and hopes that the new god that shot his pet is more chatty than her reputation precedes.
eldritch has only one guard left.
artemis (tl;dr; set-up is artemis has already hunted two of his babes. throw me a pm if this ain’t working for you)
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Jun 10, 2016 20:36:32 GMT
Post by artemis on Jun 10, 2016 20:36:32 GMT
 There's something evil out in Little Dublin. That's what the dispatcher had said. What's really evil is the ale that they serve there, but Artemis said nothing as she pulled on her boots and left the compound.
See, only her hunters understand: there is no great war between good and evil. There is no Ragnarok, no Armageddon. There is only the path and those who are brave enough to follow.
(Is it bravery anymore when the road starts to feel like home?)
The city hums in melodies that the forest never knew. Artemis allows herself to be guided by its song, but never beholden to it. Traffic is heavy on the west end - avoid. That's not where her prey is going to be hiding, it's too conspicuous. Instead, she's guided by an unnatural squelch and the overwhelming smell of the ocean. Not the kind of smell that reminds Artemis of her uncle, mind, but the smell of cod that's been left out in the sun.
No living thing should ever be allowed to smell like that.
She finds her targets before her dogs do. Of course she does. Artemis lets loose her arrows from the top of Cassidy Hotel. The creature is a fifty meters away, but it might as well have been in front of her face.
She doesn't even pause to aim when she skewers the second guard like an octupus kabob.
The man complicates the hunt. It's not even the kind of complication that Artemis enjoys. There's something about him that makes her feel...claustrophobic. She's been claustrophobic since she arrived in this city, but the creeping feeling is a clammy hand around her neck.
Three of her hounds turn the corner and surround the man and the... things squelching on the ground. They start barking aggressively, which is not something that Artemis has come to expect from her well-trained dogs.
Artemis jumps down from seven stories, displacing several inches of concrete beneath her feet. She has exceptionally good ears, but it would be awkward for the both of them if he were to talk to thin air. She stands upright and cloaks herself with dignity, as if she had not just leapt from a height that would kill a regular human. Artemis has little patience for fanfare.
She narrows her eyes. "Explain yourself."
eldritch
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and it's creeping its way through my windows and it's slithering under my door
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Jun 12, 2016 22:46:33 GMT
Post by eldritch on Jun 12, 2016 22:46:33 GMT
and here comes her entourage. the patter of paws are not figments of emi’s mind and neither are the barks. he flinches to the open mouths, full of teeth and slobber, but rests a hand on his guard beside him. its flesh swells further beneath his palm and the eye on his wrist continues to leak. the dogs continue to bark.
“sit,” emi says. it’s never worked for him on pets before. it doesn’t hurt to try.
their owner doesn’t waste her time in joining them. she sticks the landing and emi thinks this is a new god, huh. already as rigid as those statues they made of her. intimidating. his tongue moves in the inside of his mouth, prodding against his left cheek. the fifth eye growing there blinks. his one and only human eye focuses on her.
“‘scuse me– artemis, right?” it’s the name he’s most familiar with and less consonant clusters than he’s used to. emi pushes himself up from his crouching position. as he moves up, he wrenches the arrow out of the guard beside him. it rips through mottled skin and the same acrid yellow that bleeds from his wrist starts dripping from the wound. the smell grows worse.
“calm your dogs, will ya? they’re givin’ me a headache.”
that’s the best excuse for the beating in emi’s right ear.
“ain’t you gonna explain yourself?” there’s a clatter as he drops her arrow against the ground of the alley, “i’ve not killed one of your pets.”
both his remaining, visible eyes watch her dogs and eldritch asks the goddess of revenge, “are you familiar with the term ‘tit for tat’?”
artemis |
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Jun 12, 2016 23:35:37 GMT
Post by artemis on Jun 12, 2016 23:35:37 GMT
The dogs do not sit. If anything, the voice of the tentacle man only serves to upset them further. It is only in the presence of their master that they do not tear him apart limb from limb.
His questions amuse Artemis. They implied that they would be trading blows. As if this were a boxing match instead of a hunt. As if he would be laying even a finger on her or her entourage.
She smiles mirthlessly, as if her few seconds of consideration were a gift. As if the man should be grateful. A fair and generous goddess walks this earth.
"I haven't killed you or your last tentacle for upsetting my dogs." Yet. "That can change."
They've hunted some of the most fantastical beasts since Hecules' day. None of them spooked easily.
eldritch |
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and it's creeping its way through my windows and it's slithering under my door
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Jun 17, 2016 17:27:53 GMT
Post by eldritch on Jun 17, 2016 17:27:53 GMT
the new god does nothing to quieten her dogs and her own silence is a warning as much as their howling is. the latter only worsens the ache on the side of emi’s head. despite it, emi hears faint, laboured breathing.
they’re low wheezes of something not entirely sure what the method of consuming oxygen is. ’in and out’, an avant-garde notion to some cosmic horrors. he can’t see it but he can feel its presence prickling along his arm - he has that special connection with them. his last guard is close by and its smell blends with that of its leaking, dead brethren.
emi doesn’t return artemis’ smile with his own.
“no. only my last two pets,” there’s a touch of humour to his voice despite it all. tentacle. it’s always what they pick on. but amongst its previously writhing mass, guard #2 only had three things resembling human limbs to move on. it didn’t stand a chance against a hunter. emi wonders if how he’ll do.
the congregation and their guests beyond the alley backdoor have likely heard the barking but time feels as tight as her smile. change feels inevitable.
“are you done here?” noise stirs behind the alley door. even emi can hear it above the pulsing. several metres above him, a twitching shadow slowly crawls onto the face of the building.
artemis |
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Jun 17, 2016 19:54:08 GMT
Post by artemis on Jun 17, 2016 19:54:08 GMT
Artemis pulls another arrow out of her quiver. She supposes that she can spare some parting words before she kills the third one.
"I don't suppose that you'll tell me where they come from?" If there's some kind of inter-dimensional hole that needs to be sealed, then the Initiative needs to seal it. Especially when the creatures weren't even intellegent prey. They were nusiances that escalated the volume of emergency calls, rather than the real messes that require skill to fix.
Artemis pauses before notching her arrow. "I don't believe you. Pet owners take responsibility for their vassals." Just because a snake does not bite a charmer does not mean that it recognizes his authority.
eldritch |
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