Back Home?-No Event-BYOA

[grimholdkeeper]

After a quiet night in his room, Balthazar wakes in a labyrinth of clutter and dust, sprawled across a threadbare red velvet divan. The smell of the place, and the feel, is so utterly familiar he sits bolt upright. Home? Home! Delight and relief are immediately replaced by a vague sense of regret. He can't quite remember where he thought he

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[purewhitepaws]

So this was the place. The tour-guide of another group had mentioned it in passing, and as if bewitched, he'd found himself pulled inside. Or rather, even if he'd considered not going in, he wouldn't have been able to

[puresilverpaws]

Roi makes a statement-like noise, and carefully starts to sniff the air, only to not need to use his sense of smell, since he hears and see the shelf wobble. He bunches the muscles in his body, and lets out a low hiss in warning, very much trying to imitate and intimidate the creature by impersonating a snake. To keep his fear at bay, he focuses on the idea of a hunt. He's gone hunting before. It's fighting for his life that's scary.

[grimholdkeeper]

Balthazar does lots of fighting for his life. It's fighting for other peoples' lives that gets him anxious. "Don't lunge," he murmurs. "We don't know what it--"

He cuts himself off with a gasp as the creature appears, rearing up from beneath a shrouded table, its head easily at the level of Balthazar's waist. It's not a lizard, precisely, but it's not a snake, either, at least six sets of clawed legs dangling from the rearing front part of its body. There may be more; the remainder of it is still hidden. Its face is snub-nosed, but when the mouth drops open it shows an array of wicked fangs.

"South American basilisk," Balthazar murmurs quietly, identifying the monster quickly. "Try not to meet its eyes."

Hideously venomous, these things. Even a prolonged stare is sometimes enough to sicken or paralyze. He's watching its shadow on the floor.

((I thought I had replied to this yesterday. Sorry!))

[puresilverpaws]

Wait, a basilisk? Roi hisses again and growls in the most menacing way that he can, bearing his sharp teeth. In the back of his head, he wishes that he was a wild and not a domestic, for the wilds' crushing power of the jaw is far superior to this own.

But he will have to make due. He's not the most agile thing in human form, so this one will have to do.

His body stays bunched, and he stares at the creature's maw. So long as he does not meet the creature's eyes, he should be okay. Basilisks in movies and games alike tend to petrify others - literally - so maybe that's what it does? Even so, he recognizes that his intimidation may not work as well.

{Not a problem in the slightest! :)}}

[grimholdkeeper]

Balthazar backs up a few steps, urging Roi to keep pace with him, and continues to watch the shadow as the creature twitches, hisses, and edges after them. It's not certain, just yet, whether they're food or rivals, but it's hoping it has them on the run. Balthazar gropes a shelf behind him, coming up with an antique hand-mirror. Angling it cautiously, he's able to get a better look at the beast.

"If I get bitten, run upstairs and barricade yourself in my apartment," he orders quietly. He's not sure whether his guest will obey him or not, but he's hoping the younger man is willing to trust him.

[puresilverpaws]

Roi makes a displeased growl at Balthazar, but then sneezes and quickly rubs a paw over his nose. His tail puffs out. He doesn't really like that idea. But in this form, he can't exactly talk. Fuck. Balthazar better not be the self-sacrificing type for something like this.

Roi shifts his body to try and make himself look more impressive in size, but... yeah. The freakin' lizard is bigger than him.

Fucksticks.

[grimholdkeeper]

In a sense, he is the self-sacrificing type, but not to the point of getting himself killed. He has a role to play before he can allow that. He watches in the mirror as the lizard circles, stalking.

Abruptly, his ring glows, and a coil of blue-white energy courses along the blade. Balthazar darts to one side and lashes out, steel meeting scales. The trouble with supernatural creatures is that they tend to be resistant to both weaponry and magic, and this one is no exception, but the sword appears to have cut into its side. Dark ichor hisses on the floor.

[puresilverpaws]

Although he'd like to, Roi doesn't take the time to admire the attack. Instead, he launches himself for that weak point, very sharp claws digging in where the flesh was cut as he lands on the beast's side, and then using his momentum to twist his body and yank. He's not sure if he can tear the hide open further, but the hunt is on, and how dare it barge in on them!

Maybe he can weigh its head down for an easy kill? Once he's sure of his footing here, he intends on finding out.

[grimholdkeeper]

Roi's claws are at least as effective as the blade, and the gash rips open wider. Unfortunately, the ichor scalds like a chemical burn. Balthazar makes a small, anxious sound and turns to strikes at the monster again, afraid it will turn and bite, or that the blood it leaks will poison the cat tearing at it.

((Up to you what effect the blood might have on Roi; as long as it's not too dire, Balthazar can help heal it.))

[puresilverpaws]

He feels the spray against his paws, and he lets out a raw hiss in pain, but doesn't let go. He clamors up the creature's body, intent on reaching its head. If he can do that, maybe he can chomp down on its vitals - if it has any, which it should - in its neck.

Which he tries to sink his teeth into. Hard. Wherever his teeth manage to sink into - whether its neck or its shoulder, the spray of the gore into his mouth is a bit too much what he was expecting in the heat of the moment. His mouth burns and his paws ache from the pain of having that ichor spray onto his sensitive feet. The external pain is more tolerable than the pain in his maw, and so he tries to get a grip over himself in order to change tactics.

{Okiedokie. :3~}}

[grimholdkeeper]

Balthazar watches, horrified as the cat gets closer to the lethal head of the monster. Dropping his sword, he tears at his own coat, pulling it off hastily and casting it over the basilisk's head, which has already been brought close to the floor by Roi's attack. The sorcerer lunges in, dropping to his knees to pin the coat and the serpent beneath it. All the monster's legs scrabble and dig little ruts in the floorboards, but the sorcerer presses the stone of his ring hard against the scales and hisses a few soft words under his breath.

Light pours from the stone and the hand that wears it, sizzling over the scaly skin. The tail thrashes, knocking over a shelf, but the spasms weaken rapidly. Between magic and wounds, the basilisk is soon still and dead.

Panting, Balthazar turns to look at Roi. "We need to clean you off fast."

[purewhitepaws]

Oh, oh god, that shit still burns and Roi quickly scrambles off of the beast, stumbling from the burn-like pain that flares up his feet, especially as he accidentally steps into the ichor on the ground. Knowing that his fur is in the way, once he's safely away from the beast, he shifts back into human form.

Much like his fur had been sprayed, his clothes are also sullied, and he starts trying to yank them off, with no regard to if his hold shreds the tough material. Anything to make that burning go away! He could tolerate it better with his larger mass, but like this, it feels like it burns up, past his flesh. Even his mouth burns, far worse than accidentally ingesting a very hot pepper.

"The... the hell... is this...?! Shit, shit!" he hisses and spits (literally,) latching onto adrenaline to keep from outright crying from pain. God, what in the hell possessed him to bite the damn thing? It was in his mouth oh-god what-the-hell-is-that-shit???

[grimholdkeeper]

"I told you it was poisonous!" He gets up and goes quickly to Roi's side, helping pull his clothes off with a similar disregard for the end state of the fabric. Except he did bite the damn thing and that's going to be even worse to deal with. Urgently, he strips the younger man down to underwear, then scoops him up and makes a run for the stairs that lead up to his apartment. Holy water's no good for basilisk venom; the best thing will be to wash as much as possible off his skin and out of his mouth, then treat the symptoms that remain with herbs or magic or both.

Whether Roi protests or not, Balthazar's prepared to drag him up to the bathroom and plunge him into the shower. "Breathe. Just breathe, through your nose. It's going to be all right."

((I'm off for the night, sorry for being late/slow. Still dogsitting. :P Should be around late tomorrow.))

[purewhitepaws]

Roi keeps sputtering as Balthazar strips him. He honestly doesn't care, and it's getting uncomfortable to talk. But adrenaline keeps his mouth going. "Th--the hell you did! You said not to look at it's eyes! Or if you get bit, for meto run and hide! Nothing about it's goddamn blood! Fuck!" Honestly, Roi doesn't have too much body mass, so it's rather easy to haul him around. Willing to do much of anything to get the damn burns off of him.

He doesn't have much of a defense for his biting the thing - really, the only thing on his mind at the time was to take the creature down so it couldn't hurt them. He figured that the blood was just high in acidity, not toxic.

Still, unless Balthazar is fully carrying him, climbing the stairs feels painful, and he does his best not to stumble or limp. He's endured pain like this before, he tells himself in the back of his mind, so this shouldn't be much different.

{It's okay. :3 I've been kinda lazy today, and I do have to do dishes. And my father and I had to go use the laundromat because our

[grimholdkeeper]

He thinks back a moment and has to concede that Roi's correct. He didn't warn about corrosive blood specifically, although in Balthazar's defense, he didn't really expect him to attack the basilisk, either. He's not an overly strong man, but Roi's size and his own adrenaline rush make it possible for him to haul him upstairs and into the apartment, carrying him fully.

A light kick opens the bathroom door, and the shower comes on almost as if of its own accord, the water cool, but warm enough to not be a horrible shock to the system. Balthazar actually steps into the tub with Roi, cradling him against his chest and angling him in such a way as to allow the burning blood to rinse off quickly and fully. "Rinse and spit," he orders quietly, "Don't swallow."

They're both getting drenched. Balthazar's shoes will probably never recover.

((I saw the list; that'll be helpful, thank you!))

[purewhitepaws]

He doesn't have to be told twice. Although the cool water definitely startles him briefly into stillness, Roi recovers enough to follow the instructions. While the water helps to wash away what's causing the pain, he tries to focus on rinsing his mouth out. Again and again. He doesn't know how potent that blood is, and he'd rather not lose his tongue.

For now, the urge to make the pain stop is enough to keep him from unraveling into hysterics.

{:3}}