The Park, Friday Afternoon (Before Detention's Visiting Hours)

[poison_pretty]

Karla had been patrolling this morning and, Mother Night, was it such a rush. The ability to do as she pleased--so long as she was obeying the rules, of course!--when she pleased and where she pleased was practically intoxicating. She'd been skulking and hiding for so long, hoarding her Craft like a miser, Bah! What kind of life was what? She

Comments

[world_enchanted]

Tara, on her way back from a post office trip to get a certain gift item for Kenzi, was about to greet Karla when she smelled the air and realized what the other girl was doing. She'd hoped the news was wrong about her, but ...

Tara's stomach twisted.

"Karla?" she said uncertainly. "Hi. What -- what are you doing?"

[poison_pretty]

"Keeping everyone in line," Karla said brightly, turning a merry grin to Tara. "Even the least important creatures need to be held in check. Chaos can come from anywhere." She sniffed and lit a flamingo's tail feathers on fire. "It's not like there's much of a step between animals and landens anyway."

[world_enchanted]

"Between animals and,and landens?" Tara repeated, wincing for the poor flamingo. "Karla, the bird didn't do anything to ... anyone, except maybe a couple bugs."

[poison_pretty]

"It was looking at me funny," Karla retorted. "And it wasn't keeping its feathers clean. Lady Umbridge loves pink. If it's not going to wear her color with the pride and respect it's due, then it doesn't deserve to wear feathers at all."

So there, Tara. So there.

[lockeunlocked]

Peter honestly preferred being holed up in the warehouse with Ender to having to go out and run errands, but the truth of the matter was that if he sat on his ass and let everyone else take all the risks, nobody would even bother taking him seriously.

So there he was, hood yanked over his head as he tried to hurry along the Park as fast as humanely possi--

He bit down on a have you gone insane?! because he'd heard about the plan. Instead he'd try and hurry right past her.

[poison_pretty]

Oh, but Peter. Karla could sense psychic scents. And, having been so intimately acquainted with you for so long, she knew yours. Very well.

Karla let him rush past her, then pulled up a few shields and ran, outdistancing him. When she'd gotten far enough ahead, she dropped her shields and relaxed against a tree, waiting for him to come into sight again.

"Kiss kiss," she called. "No time for a chat, lover?"

[lockeunlocked]

"Did you just honestly use the word lover without irony?" Peter asked.

He didn't stop. That would be stupid.

[poison_pretty]

"Oh no, there was plenty of irony there," Karla assured him, happily tagging along. "Otherwise I would have used 'pet.'"

[archparakeet]

Warren had been out having another flight, out getting a feel for the wind moving over his face. He was still a little out of sorts after Tuesday, still feeling dirty after Wednesday, and there was something hanging in the air these days that had him on edge for reasons he couldn't quite put a finger on.

It was the smell of burned feathers that caught him. He knew that smell intimately. It was the last thing he'd smelled before he realized he wasn't going to fly with wings of his own again. And the cause of it...

"What the hell did the flamingos do to you?"

... Sometimes, meeting Karla required a special sort of bluntness as Warren landed behind her. Because no other response could possibly be correct.

[poison_pretty]

Unlike her reaction to meeting Tara and Peter, Karla was quite thrilled to see Warren.

"Love!" she cried, turning to face him with a joyous smile. She ignored the question about flamingos. It was obviously irrelevant. "I've missed you! I was thinking about knocking on your door later."

[archparakeet]

... Oookay. That was pretty much the exact opposite of what Warren had been expecting, right there. It caught him off-guard enough that he just sort of stood there, wide-eyed and blinking.

"You... on my door?"

[poison_pretty]

"Of course!" Karla said, wishing she could fling her arms around him and hold him tight. But, of course, that was against the rules. It was okay for them to have rutted like animals when they were both on the wrong side, but now... "Oh, don't look so stunned, darling! I know that we fought and it got ugly for awhile, but you can finally forgive me!" Her smile only brightened at him as she allowed herself to imagine being swept up for another kiss. "I'm so sorry for those dreadful things I said; I just didn't understand. But now that I've seen the light and come to the right side, everything is so much clearer now!"

[leavingthenest]

Rapunzel tended to hide in her room most of the time, but once every day or two she did a furtive sweep of the island, looking for anyone who might be hurt that might need her help. Because as scary as it was, she knew she'd feel terrible if there was something she could do and then didn't do it.

Most of the time she felt terrible even when there wasn't anything she could have done.

But now, in the park, she smelled burning. And not just burning wood or leaves, but... something else? That was probably bad. She should make sure that no one was hurt...

[poison_pretty]

No one was hurt here, Rapunzel! Well, not unless you counted a few mite-ridden flamingos. But no one really did, did they? In fact, Karla was practicing with her Craft to see which baby flamingo squawked the loudest when she lit their little stubby tails on fire.

[leavingthenest]

Well, Rapunzel kind of did, actually. Her eyes went wide. "What are you doing!" she exclaimed, rushing forward rather than laying low.

Because she was smart that way.

[poison_pretty]

"Keeping the flamingos in line," Karla said, unfazed by Rapunzel's own ruffled feathers ahaha, I'm hilarious.

[sonofgreathern]

Much like it hat been back home, a lot of Tim's job was strictly PR. In this case, setting a good example, and letting everyone see how wonderful life could be, if we, kept the ten commandments of Umbrage.

"Woah." he laughed, when he saw what Karla was up to. "Nice shot."

[poison_pretty]

Karla turned around and winked at him. "Thank you," she said, dimpling prettily as if he had just complimented her on how nice she looked today. "Keeping order in all ranks from the bottom up."

[sonofgreathern]

"I used to have to do the same thing with the ducks." Tim said. "I never would have expected it of them, but they were some violent birds."

[poison_pretty]

"Waterfowl are disgusting," Karla said, curling her lip. "And vicious. If the flamingos weren't pink and therefore pleasing to the Lady, I'd rid the parkn of the filthy thing."