Gathering Peascods [closed]

[mountain_tree]

Character(s): Micas, Ana, Simera
Content: Looking for food and other useful things
Setting: The residences around the Library
Warnings: Simera being really cute. Potential killing of things.

Comments

[ivyalchemist]

Ana was already tense enough going in to the building. Everything there was just so... so silent. The near deafening quiet left a buzzing in her ears, different than the one of home. Home was noisy no matter what, be it cars or people or wind and no where you could go could get away from such noises, and her ears just weren't used to every little crunch and shift being like a crack in the quiet. Everything, everything made her jump, so much so that by the time Micas hauled her through the opening she just wanted to grab the stuff and make a fast track back for the library. She didn't know if her muscles were ever going to relax...

Simera had already hopped over to what had been a pantry, one door hanging loosely from its rusted hinges while the other creaked loudly when it was opened. Both bags in her arms, Ana followed, going to the counters and cupboards near by to search for anything useful.

Most of them came up empty, though a few items where snagged here and there, not even filling half a bag She turned to tell Simera that she was going to check some of the other rooms, when Micas' shrill sharp whistle cut through the air. Her heart hit her stomach like a rock as another presence in the room made itself clear, growling low as it stalked from the shadows just scant feet from where she stood.

"Shit!" Ana yelped, bags falling from her wrists and hitting the floor. Her hand slapped harshly to the alchemic charm, and just as the cat went to pounce, dangerous and frightening claws extended for her face, she ducked, slamming both hands flat to the floor. The air crackled, pulled in, and from the weak linoleum floor a short, barely wide enough curved wall rose in front of her, clipping the creature in the jaw. Ana fell backwards, cracking her head ungracefully on the rusted metal handle of the drawer behind her. She felt skin slice and warmth spread in to her hair, cursing all the while.

The reprieve did not last, as the cat let out an irritated yowl, back on its feet before Ana could even shake the dizziness away. It wasted no time in charging at her defense, attempting to scrabble over the slick surface, cracking the top with its heavy paws. She screamed, throwing an arm up over her face just in time for another swipe to catch fabric and skin, tearing in to her. More blood, more pain, but this time she managed to keep her cool.

Another crackle, and from the wood of the cupboard beside her a pole shot out, this time catching the cat right in its eye and sending it spinning across the ground, momentarily dazed.

"MICAS!" Ana shrieked. She finally got to her feet, shaken and winded, but wedged herself through the small gap she'd left, only to see another cat, this time in Simera's path, the two of them having a stare down.

"Oh mother fucker," Ana groaned.

[thejoychild]

Simera looked up in time to see Ana make a wall out of the floor and disappear inside of it. The gimacat that tried to climb up it was thrown backwards and then another appeared, walking slowly towards Simera. She stared at it for a moment. She heard Ana yelling. She decided that it was time to slow things down.

She closed her eyes as the gimacat in front of her jumped in her direction, its mouth open and claws extended, and concentrated on slowing everything down. When she opened her eyes again, the gimacat was hanging in the air, looking very fierce, and Simera could see Ana behind it looking scared. She stared at the gimacat in front of her as it crept slowly through the air and considered what to do.

Popping the gimacat's head the previous day had been difficult and she had been scratched quite painfully. It had also been heavy on top of her and made it difficult to breath. Popping their heads was not the best way to go. She decided that cutting it would be much more efficient.

She looked toward the kitchen, where Ana had dropped her bag and then ducked under the gimacat's paw and hurried over to it. There were cooking tools inside of it and among them, Simera found a large chopping knife. That would work.

The gimacat that had tried to jump on her was almost to where she had been now and Simera ran back over to it and held the knife up high, then in a fluid motion, brought it down on the gimacat's neck. It went in a few inches but not through, and so she lifted it again and concentrated on being stronger. This time the knife went all the way through it's neck on one side, although wasn't long enough to sever it completely.

She looked up to where the cat that had tried to climb Ana's wall was. It had half picked itself up off of the floor and was looking at Ana. Simera ran across the floor to it, and brought the knife to its neck, this time from bellow to see if that worked better.

After she had cut the second gimacat's neck, she let time speed up again and watched it jerk while the other crashed into the wall behind where she had been.

[mountain_tree]

Micas had just fired at the second of the cats outside the window when she heard Ana call. They had managed to get inside!

Running to the room where the voice had come from, Micas froze to find two dead cats, Simera standing with a bloody cleaver in her hand, and Ana on the ground behind an odd protuberance in the floor that didn't look like it should be there. There was also a pole sticking out of the wood wall that did not seem to have any structural reason.

Patting Simera on her head encouragingly, as she passed, Micas knelt before Ana and checked where she was hurt.

Her arm, and the back of her head. She pulled the damaged fabric off of Ana's injured arm, and folded it into a compress, pulling a bowstring from her pouch and using it to tie the bandage in place. Then she took the other of Ana's bracers off and held it to the wound on her head, applying pressure even as she checked the woman's eyes to make sure she did not have a concussion.

[ivyalchemist]

Ana could swear later that if she hadn't seen it with her own eyes, she wouldn't have believed it. In a flash, quicker than alchemy, quicker than anything Simera had dispatched not one, but two of the cats, leaving them bleeding on the dusty floor. The shock was enough to send her already unbalanced self tumbling, and that was where Micas had found them. The silent girl was at her side, wrapping her arm and pressing fabric to her head, and the daze cleared some, though her head was still reeling from the hit she'd taken.

"Damn," she hissed in irritation, wondering just how many more times she was going to play that song and dance with the gimacats. She hated pain enough as it was, she didn't need to get scratched on a daily basis on top of that.

"Thanks, Mi-"

Glass shattered, the sound sharp and frightening clear in the quiet after the fray, and Ana's eyes went positively huge as another cat, one that had been hiding even away from its other kin, burst through the window at Micas' back.

"LOOK OUT!"

Too late, always too damn late. A swipe landed square on the dark girl's shoulder and she went down, blood splattering from the wound. But the cat didn't stop there. Furious, no longer wanting to feed but wanting revenge for the death of its family, it went for Ana next. Terrified, she shrieked, but her hands moved in autopilot. Array, floor, crackle, and the next thing she knew blood was spilling down on her, two sharp spikes from the linoleum impaling it from either side. It hung loosely in its death, jaw slack and wounds oozing, dripping, staining her clothes and skin.

She stared, gaping and panting as its red eyes faded to darkness, still locked eternally on her. Surprisingly, she didn't feel sick, not like she had when she saw the one that Simera had first killed, but she was still stunned, and a little disturbed at her own actions.

[thejoychild]

Simera whimpered. She had fallen backwards in surprise when another gimacat jumped through the window and tripped over the slain gimacat behind her. 'It hurts...' she whined, tears coming into her eyes as she looked down at where the knife had stuck into her thigh. She could feel a few bits of broken glass and debris stuck in her hip and arm where she'd landed.

She looked mournfully at the knife in her thigh for another moment before pulling it out with a sharp gasp of pain.

[mountain_tree]

Micas pushed herself up with a hiss, looking from Ana to Simera. They were all wounded now. But they had killed 5 more Gimacats, and that would feed them comfortably for a while then. Though making more protective clothing for the other girls was now high on her list of priorities. Thanks to her shirt being leather, the gashes in her shoulder were not as deep as they might have been. She ignored them for now. Snapping the spikes that held it, she pulled the last cat away from Ana, then moved over to Simera, applying pressure to the girl's thigh with her had as she unlaced the lower half of her own sleeve to wrap around and cinch over the wound. She smiled at the girl again, ruffling her hair and kissing her forehead, before taking the knife from her and handing it to Ana.

Then she considered the three dead cats in the kitchen with a frown.

Pulling out her snare-rope, very much favoring her right arm, she tied the hind legs of the three cats together and hefted the whole mass up over her uninjured shoulder. Going cautiously back into the hall, Micas retrieved her bow and quiver, throwing the bodies out the window, and then drawing her knife before following. Once outside she pulled her arrows out of the cats she had shot, and put them back in the quiver, strapping it to her hip rather than loop it across her injured shoulder.

It will take more than one trip, to take it all back, she frowned.

[ivyalchemist]

Ana followed, right arm hanging loosely at her side as the blood continued to soak in to the pink fabric, spreading in spots like blossoms across the top. Hex was going to throw a fit to see her in such a state again, but at least the injuries were far less than the previous time.

Out in the glaring red light again, she glanced at Micas long enough to see the frown, and gathered just what was going through the girl's mind.

A glint, faint at first, caught Ana's eye, and she turned. The grin that spread across her features was positively wicked, and for the first time since their arrival she finally felt like something was giving her an advantage.

"Hang on," she said to Micas, darting to the side where the hub of a rusted, slightly tilted car sat in a driveway not belonging to the house they were just at. It was small, looked vaguely like a compact car from her world, and some flecks along the rusted surface seemed to indicate that it had been blue in color before its untimely stationary demise.

Her arm still stung like crazy, making it hard to flex fingers or move it, but she was still able to tap her fingers to the charm and place both lowly on the vehicle. The reaction crackled and fizzled over its surface, glowing brightly yellow as it warped, twisted, and shrunk.

The light faded slowly, some arcs still lashing over the ground, but in its wake a small, wide metal cart was revealed, the wheels large, rims flat with a multitude of crisscrossing spokes to keep it supported. It had no engine, but a wide, high backed seat had been put in the front, some low walls constructed in a box behind it, perfect for carrying things.

"Well, what do you think? I mean, we'll have to pull it, but there's enough of a small slope here that it shouldn't be too hard," she asked of the other girls, beaming at her creation.

[mountain_tree]

Eyes widening in alarm at first, Micas just gaped as Ana turned the rusted hulk of metal into a cart.

Oh, you brilliant beautiful woman, she exalted, hugging Ana carefully and then lifting the corpses of the gimacats into the cart, still favoring her right arm somewhat. Making sure Ana still had the knife to defend herself with, Micas headed back inside to re-claim the bags from the kitchen.

Maybe there were bandages somewhere in the building. Or soap.

[thejoychild]

Simera poked at the bandage Micas had tied to her leg. The flesh underneath ached, but no long had the sharp, stinging pain it had when the knife was there. She got up after a moment and picked away the few bits of debris that were still embedded in her hip before following the other two girls out of the building.

When Ana made the cart, Simera clapped her hands and squealed delightedly. She liked the lights as well as the way the object had changed shape under Ana's hands. 'Oh that's neat!' she exclaimed. 'How did you do that, Ana?' she asked excitedly as she picked up one of the gimacats to help Micas put them on the cart.

[ivyalchemist]

"That," Ana stated, placing a fist on her hip, other arm still too achy to move properly, "would be alchemy. Me and Hex can both do it. We just use energy and symbols to change one object in to another. Can't make it any bigger, though. It has to be equivalent exchange, same for same."

Her slightly rambling explanation over, she snagged another of the cats, grimacing a little as something made a nasty, sickening squish noise, and hauled it slowly over, only able to grip with one hand.

"I just hope the boys aren't running in to as much trouble as we had..."

[mountain_tree]

Micas looked quite pleased, loading up the bags on top of the dead cats. She'd never used a cart before, but just looking at it, the mechanics of the simple machines had been apparent enough to her.

She looked at the others, pointed back inside, and tilted her head to the side, a questioning look.

[ivyalchemist]

Ana stared at the point, gears grinding until she realized finally that Micas was indicating the house and what may still lay inside it. In the fight, they'd missed a chance to get the actual food stuffs they needed.

Nodding, she snagged the half full bag and the other empty one, shaking off some of the blood that splattered but had yet to dry on the off white fabric.

"Some one should watch the cart. Simera, want to come with me to grab some of those jars before we take off?"

[thejoychild]

'Kay!' Simera hurried eagerly after her and into the pantry. She started climbing up on a lower shelf to reach a the larger jars on the upper ones.

[ivyalchemist]

With Simera tending to the pantry shelves, Ana ducked down and repaired the damage done by her alchemy first in order to access the lower cupboard doors blocked by the wall and spikes.

Dust billowed out in a puff from the first door, resulting in a harsh cough and a layer of it sticking to the still damp blood stains on her. She waved it away and crawled in, getting even more filthy on the way, but came back victorious, several unmarked cans scraping as she shoved them out behind her. They clanked and rolled, but no major damage was sustained. There was no way of know, of course, if anything inside was edible, but it was a matter of getting what could be grabbed, not being picky.

She loaded up her bag until it was near bursting, looking to Simera to see how she was doing.

"How's it going up there?" she called, jokingly cupping a hand around her mouth with a grin, teasing the girl about being up so high.

[thejoychild]

'There's some metal jars, but they're gross,' Simera announced, hooking her arm around a large, glass jar and pulling it to the edge of the shelf. She then held it out for Ana. 'There's orange things and green things in jars too! And there's lots of dust!'

[ivyalchemist]

"Well, so long as nothing's dented or open, it should be alright. We can sort through anything that's nasty inside back at the library," Ana reasoned, standing and brushing her pants off, frowning when it only served to smear the blood around.

"If you're ready, lets get going. We still have to pull the cart."