FernStone

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

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Interactions: Sloane @Atrophy

Kari’s House

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Fire, then a glowing green shield saving them from an inevitable death. Luca let out a sigh of relief.

He at least wanted the year or so he had left.

”I'll get out of the way.”

The shield dropped, and Luca ran away from the group... Not at a particularly fast pace. He didn't want to collapse, his lungs already protesting going any faster than a walk. But he didn't want to flee. He may be a burden on the battlefield, but maybe he could protect someone... Luca stopped jogging as he almost tripped over a body. What the fuck?

Zombies were falling from the sky. Luca looked up, shielding his eyes from the bright light of the portal. Brianna's portal, Nadine's undead. Shit.

He wasn't worried about himself. The aura around him already started to hurt them, and a single touch would destroy them. It was the others he was worried about. People who didn't have a body that destroyed anything it touched - so close to being just like those zombies, dead and rotten from inside and out.

A zombie meandered near him, and he stepped out of the way, hand shooting up to catch it. The flesh rotted further beneath his fingers, travelling down the undead creature before it was destroyed.

Luca grimaced. He pulled off his button down shirt, strengthening the decay in his hands so it disintegrated beneath his fingers. Underneath was a loose tank top - leaving his shoulders and arms bare. His shoulder bones were prominent, arms skinny but currently undamaged aside from a myriad of scars he couldn't even remember the origin of. More skin to touch, and to rot them away.

Another zombie came for him, and Luca just raised a bare arm. It went for it... and already rotting flesh disintegrated in moments.

Without much to worry about himself, Luca quickly looked around. His head went towards Linqian first - plenty of people there, she was awake, they were fine... Jasper was there too. Jasper was topless. Luca had seen it before when he'd rotted off Jasper's shirt when terrified by Skelly but... With the effect of the rain it looked- stop looking at Jasper's chest!

Luca tore his gaze away and caught sight of Sloane, surrounded by zombies. Sloane didn't have an offensive abstraction. She was close enough for him to help. Luca changed direction, and started to run towards him. He didn't bother avoiding the zombies - rotting his way through them, ignoring the pain that came whenever they managed to touch him. The healing elixir had given him enough strength to be more functional than he had in a long time.

”Sloane!” Luca shouted. He shoved his whole body through the zombies - the moment they touched him, they rotted away in a gory display of peeling flesh revealing muscle and bone until it all turned to dust. Another lunged for him. Luca didn't bother to move as it crashed into his shoulder, causing him to wobble as it decayed. Even as it died his skin tore from the impact, blood dripping down his arm. He caught himself on another zombie, grimacing at the feeling of already decomposed skin turning soft beneath his fingers. He ignored the bleeding - a surface level wound, not something that would kill him.

Luca properly pushed through the undead surrounding Sloane, getting close enough that she'd feel his aura prickling against her. Only a step away - closer than he tended to get to people.

”They can't hurt me,” he panted, ignoring what felt like glass shards scraping his lungs. The running, the rain... It was taking its toll on his weak organs. But it was a base level pain that he was used to, and an improvement over the last few days.

Left.

Hearing the Rot's warning he twisted around, arm shooting out to catch a zombie that lunged for Sloane. He was so close to her now, just narrowly avoiding brushing against her as the zombies rotting flesh peeled off and dropped to the mud covered floor with a wet plop. He smiled at her as the rest of it was easily destroyed.

”I'll clear us a path. Stay close to me... But not too close, I can't choose what I rot. It's cooperating right now, but...” he pointed to his left eye, hints of putrid green tendrils pushing at the edges of his iris. The effect of actively choosing to use his rotting, giving the Rot the destruction it desired. He would have to suppress it to turn off his rotting touch, and that would take concentration and energy he didn't have. He needed to stay in control, but he couldn't guarantee it. ”If it gets worse, get away from me too. Just in case! I'm in control, and it rarely gets through- so it'll be fine! Just make sure not to touch me.”

He turned back around, hands pushing forward through the nearest zombies, forcing an opening where there hadn't been one before.

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

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Interactions: Britney @Punished GN, Aryin / Jasper @NoriWasHere
Kari's House

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Linqian’s head was spinning, the blackness of her closed eyes somehow spinning in front of her. She zoned out, brain moving at a sluggish pace, as she tried to get it under control. She could deal with the pain, which was honestly pretty minimal, much better than this. Pain could be fought through, dizziness fucking destroyed her. How was she supposed to punch shit when it kept moving? Ugh, she really needed Sully to-

Ice cold water smacked her face, sizzling off her heated skin - cooling further and further in the rain and steam. She spluttered, shaking her head as some of it went up her nose. It was enough to give her a bit of clarity, eyes cracking open with a groan.

”Heyyyy, Brit, since when could you water slap people?” She coughed, spitting out water that trickled into her mouth. Maybe a little bit of blood too. ”Don't worry, I'm all good, it'll take more than that to kill me.”

Linqian raised one hand, a half assed thumbs up. She didn't try to sit up yet, because she was pretty sure she'd just fall back down which would be fucking embarrassing. ”Just real fucking dizzy, Aryin's tough skin is no joke, but Vashti's skull is fucking hard... But I was too hot for that crazy bitch to kill, fuck.”

She closed her eyes again for a moment. When they opened, they were clearer, her lips curving into half of a smirk. She looked a fucking mess - glowing orange face covered in blood, nose crooked, covered in mud and rain… but she felt pretty fucking fine. Sure, Britney was waving so quickly above her that she might as well be splitting into three, but that’d be fixed in a little bit. She didn’t feel so dazed anymore.

”Remind me to just shoot Vashti the next time I see her... No attempted seduction... even if it totally worked...”

She turned her head, catching sight of the fucking zombies through the vines and then…

Linqian sat up suddenly, groaning and holding her head. Her vision swayed and blinked in and out. The burning house was a fuzzy outline in front of her, coming more and more into focus as she got more and more pissed off. Fuck. Fuck.

”All my shit's in there! My clothes, my phone, my money... my only winter jacket! Fuck! I can't fucking afford to replace any of that!” Linqian's hands raked through mud stained, damp molten curls. Fuck, she was going to have to wash her hair again as well... That was an hour or so of her time that'd be wasted tonight. Fuck. At least she could just sit and chat shit with Aryin for half of it in her bathroom… But that wasn’t important right now. ”I only got this fucking hot cause I knew I could put my fucking clothes back on… Fuck.”

The rain was cooling her further, temperature ticking down from the thousands. Still hot enough to burn through zombies, and durable enough to tank a few more hits than normal - but the longer she was getting fucking soaked, the cooler she'd get till it was practically useless.

She needed to go the opposite way - cold as fuck. But she couldn't do that without gut punching Aryin again... Would she even realise what was going on?! The heat was entirely on Linqian, so she was much more in tune with it.

And then she'd be even more fucking naked without the orange glow and molten skin to cover her. She had no fucking clothes! Where the fuck was Greyson with his very borrowable jackets when she fucking needed him?!

As if called by her thoughts, Aryin appeared - after what must’ve been a sluggish walk over. ”You look uglier than- Oof!”

Linqian should’ve expected the punch to the gut, but her mind was still running at a slower pace even as the world finally stopped spinning. She reached up and clasped Aryin’s hand, using it to pull herself up to a crouched position. ”You try taking Vashti’s skull to your face, asshole.”

She pulled back her fist and slammed it into Aryin’s stomach, pulling back in the heat. A zombie creeped around through the gap in Britney’s barrier and Linqian’s other arm shot out, grabbing it and burning away its already rotten flesh. She shoved a knee in its gut to finish it off.

”Here.”

Jasper

”Thanks, dude, I’ll try not to destroy it.”

Linqian lowered her temperature back to normal and took Jasper's shirt - she was shorter, so going for the smaller one made sense. She pulled it on and quickly buttoned it up… leaving the top two undone because she wasn't uptight like that. It covered what it had to: her tits and ass. Just. Unfortunately the risk of her flashing someone was still very fucking high, because it was loose and just the fucking wind was threatened to blow it up. It barely reached the top of her thighs…

Better than nothing.

A decaying hand pushed through a gap in the plant barrier, and Linqian’s shot up to grab it. At the same time her temperature plummeted, freezing the arm off. Linqian pulled her hand back with a grimace. The water that hadn’t already evaporated turned to ice, visibly spiralling down her bare legs like spiderwebs. Her temperature raised again slightly - still much lower than normal, but not enough so that she’d badly hurt anyone who accidentally hurt her.

She took a moment to take a look at what was going on. Zombies everywhere, Emily acting like some goofy evil bitch, Vashti and Lila fighting… the horrible massive undead creature still fucking fine. The kid taking on three alone… shit, but he could survive being shot, he’d probably be fine right? Another 8th member attacking Ken.

Linqian wasn't very good at strategy. She was good at the fighting itself - predicting her opponents moves, getting the upper hand, where to hit so that it hurt most… the individual fight, but not the overarching battle. Point her at someone and she would win, but she couldn't plan.

You have practical intelligence, not academic, is what Jinhai always said when she called herself dumb.

She wasn't sure how much she believed that, but she knew this wasn’t a fight they could easily win. There were far too many undead - they’d be overwhelmed by numbers alone. Linqian wasn’t a quitter, but she was also realistic. Or at least, having her face near smashed in by Vashti had curbed her recklessness a bit.

”We should get you out of here,” Linqian said to Britney, frowning. ”I can get rid of the zombies easily… or just fucking freeze them, then we can go out through the woods? I don’t fucking know.”

She raised her hands in an exasperated gesture, glancing over at Jasper, then Aryin. ”I’m not being a coward or some shit like that, just we don’t have enough people to deal with these assholes… they’re actually fucking organised. Better to get the ones they want the fuck away from it all… but I don’t know. I’m not a planner. Maybe I should just punch Aryin till she’s super charged then we can go destroy them or some shit.”

For once Linqian was stopping and thinking - but she fucking hated thinking. She'd had to do it far too often recently, without Jinhai to do it for her. Fuck, she was getting nowhere with this. Linqian looked back at Britney. She was smart, and she'd helped with the actual plans to defeat the Stygian Snake. ”What should we do?”

Iron and Honey: A Love Story [FernStone & AtomicEmperor]

Trisha Vanburen

"Just fuck off, I don’t care what you think."

_______________________________________________ Patricia “Trisha” Malaya Vanburen She/Her | 24 | Filipino/ British American | 5’4” | 100lbs _______________________________________________ Resentment _______________________________________________ Skills & Talents "Nothing I can do is good enough." ___________________________________ [+] Computer Programming ⫻ Trisha first tried coding when her partner at the time, Reyna, encouraged her to. She found it came quite naturally too - more so than anything ever had. But she also thought it was embarrassing thanks to the stereotypes, and has kept it secret for everyone else. Since then she’s done a lot of self learning, getting good enough to pick up contracting jobs in software development. She’s proficient in Java, Typescript, and various web server frameworks. Beekeeping ⫻ Thanks to her abstraction, Trisha had to get good at looking after bees very quickly. At first, it was something she did because she had to, but now she enjoys it. She knows how to care for her bees so they thrive, how to gather and process their honey, and how to maintain the hive itself. While she has an innate understanding of the bees’ natural behaviours thanks to her abstraction, she’s also read up on it as much as possible, making her very knowledgeable on the subject. Studying ⫻ While Trisha struggled with understanding harder concepts and memorising it, she is very good at studying. She spent most of her teen years locked in her room studying as hard as she could. She essentially brute forced her way through exams through studying everything she could. This means she has a good attention span and ability to go through materials. Language Learning ⫻ Not a skill that Trisha entirely realises she has, but she’s good at picking up other languages. She’s fluent in Filipino (Tagalog) thanks to growing up speaking it with her mom. She also speaks conversational Arabic, thanks to it being another language her mom frequently used, and basic Spanish. She’s a bit of a sponge when it comes to languages, picking up bits and pieces just from being around people speaking them.

Appearance ▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔ "The only good thing I got from my parents is my looks." Trisha is attractive, something she knows and flaunts. She isn’t shy about it, and it’s the one thing she truly has confidence in - aided by many compliments from people through the years. She stands at an average height with a slender build. This is maintained with a combination of a naturally high metabolism and exercise. She has a softly curved body, with a slightly on the smaller sized chest (but pretty much average!) and more curves towards her hips. Her skin is a tanned light brown in colour, soft and smooth from very little hard work throughout her life. She has a long, hypertrophic scar just underneath her chest that curves round onto her right side, and a couple more on her upper thighs and hips from fighting the Stygian Snake. Trisha has a smooth, diamond shaped face with a well defined jawline. She normally wears makeup, but normally goes for a more natural look with light concealer, eyeshadow and blush. Freckles are splashed across her soft nose and her full lips are normally found with natural coloured lip gloss on them. Her eye colour seems to change constantly depending on the light. They are actually hazel with a vivid brown around the pupil moving towards green at the edge. Under a lot of lighting they look a more plain brown, and dark brown under dim light. Trisha’s dark brown, near black, hair falls midway down her back, and is thick and naturally wavy. While she keeps it loose a lot of the time she can also be found with it tied up in a ponytail, a bun or twin braids on a rare occasion. Trisha has four piercings in both of her ears: three lobe piercings and one helix. She normally wears a simple gold hoop in the helix, and a variety of hoops and studs in her lobes (though she doesn’t always have an earring in every piercing). She normally wears delicate necklaces and bracelets, along with at least a couple of rings. Thanks to being born rich, Trisha can afford a variety of clothes. She dresses for her audience, with her style varying massively dependent on who she’s with. With her family, she’ll dress reasonably respectable in shirts tucked into jeans, loose dresses or skirts - that is if she’s decided to give a fuck that day. When going out to clubs, pubs or parties, she’ll dress in form fitting and revealing dresses or skirts that rarely go below mid thigh in shades of black, bright reds or shiny silvers. These are her outfits to impress and attract, and what she’s most confident in wearing. With her university friends, her fashion is a bit more varied between the club wear, to a more casual crop top and trousers combination that she felt more comfortable wearing around them the longer she knew them. When at home (unless people are visiting) she’ll wear sweats and large, oversized hoodies. When Trisha dresses for herself she tends to wear crop tops (especially tank top style) with wide legged trousers or cargo pants, and shorts in summer. She also enjoys wearing casual dresses or skirts on some days, tighter dresses on others, and dungarees over a crop top when she’s feeling cute. Her clothes are in a wide variety of colours, but she tends to wear more neutral tones when dressing for herself. When it’s cold she’ll wear a thick puffer jacket, of which she owns multiple, or a longer wool coat. While Trisha tends to dress for what she wants to show other people, she is comfortable and confident in almost everything she wears.

_{Psychology
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"Nobody knows me. They just try to shove me in a box and get pissed off when I don't fit. It's not my fault they don't like me.”

MAIN GOAL ⫻ Trisha wants to find someone that will truly love her and stay with her. She wants to settle down and start a family of her own, to have kids and give them a life better than her own. But she also wants to find purpose - something she can actually do, rather than just aimlessly moving forward dependent on her family. She doesn’t just want to be another Vanburen, she wants to be herself, completely independent. Underneath it all, she wants her mom’s love, even though she’s accepted she’ll never get it.

PHILOSOPHY ⫻ That the only person you can truly depend upon is yourself, because everyone else will eventually abandon you. You have to look after yourself because no one else will bother. Trisha believes that you should never truly open up yourself to another person, because it will only hurt you in the end. Deep, deep down she believes there’s a place for everyone - and she just hasn’t found hers yet.

SECRETS ⫻ To Trisha, anything but the surface level of herself is a secret. All her deep seated issues - fear of abandonment, lack of self confidence, the cause of her resentment, are kept hidden. She hides that she has essentially no contact with her mom - they haven’t talked for almost two years. Trisha keeps a tight lock on how truly broken she feels. Then, there’s her selective secrets - she hides her magic from her mom and presumably blind siblings, how hard working she used to be from her university friends, and the number of people she’s been with (and dropped by) from future partners.

SEXUALITY ⫻ Pansexual, Trisha has been with many people with no care for gender. She’s generally dated more men, but doesn’t actually have a preference.

FEARS ⫻ Trisha is scared that she’ll never be good enough - for her mom, for her future partner, and for herself. She fears that she will continue to fail at everything she does. But more than that, Trisha fears being abandoned and losing anyone she begins to care for. This fear has come true time and time again to the point it feels more like a reality. It’s a self fulfilling prophecy when she pushes away people over the tiniest of issues. As part of this she fears becoming like her mom - falling in love with someone that will abandon her without a second thought. This already manifests in her quick but shallow attachment to anyone who shows her affection, only reinforcing the toxic cycle she’s in. She truly, deeply fears being alone even when she is the one that causes her isolation the most.

REPUTATION IN OLD COVEN ⫻ Mixed, but mostly negative, Trisha wasn’t a well liked figure in the old coven. While she was better with the coven members than she was with her family, Trisha was an incredibly bitter teen in the midst of puberty. She was even quicker to snap, to blame others for any mistakes and to straight up ignore others. While she was part of the rich kid clique, she did socialise outside of it and somehow saw the coven as somewhere she belonged… even if not many people liked her. Along with being viewed as someone irritating at best by most of the coven, Trisha also had a reputation for flirting around. She dated at least six people during the coven days, and spent very little time single… further leading to her poor reputation within it.

ROLE IN THE BATTLE AGAINST THE STYGIAN SNAKE ⫻ Trisha fought the Stygian Snake’s apparitions with her bees, using them to overwhelm larger creatures and easily picking off smaller ones. They also served as surveillance, and she used her alarm pheromones to both bolster allies and warn them. In the final battle she helped subdue the snake.

FLAWS ⫻ For Trisha, there’s always someone else to blame. She grew up being taught that someone else was to blame for what had happened in her life, with her mom poisoning her heavily against her dad and his affair partner. This resulted in a deep bitterness and heavy resentment towards certain family members along with James Vanburen himself. Trisha is quick to snap, being upset by the smallest things. Her anger comes in a cold and scathing manner, with harsh biting words or a cold shoulder rather than properly blowing up. Though outwardly projecting a don’t give a fuck attitude, Trisha has crippling self confidence issues as a result of never being good enough growing up along with a fear of abandonment. She always expects people to leave her and so she never opens up, and lashes out at the first sign of rejection. At the same time she grows easily attached to anyone who’s nice to her - quick to latch on, with all the jealousy and anxieties that come along with it, but refusing to open up. She rarely shares anything beyond the surface level of herself, being completely closed off even to the few close friends she has. Trisha uses relationships as a crutch, something to hold herself up rather than fixing any of the actual problems in her life. This leads to often unhealthy dynamics, on both sides. She’s self sabotaging when it comes to relationships, petty and grudge holding, and above all else can’t admit that she needs to change to truly make things better for herself.

_{Backstory
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"Fuck everyone that made me who I am today."

Trisha was born to James Vanburen and his wife at the time, Maria Mendoza. The two had met while James was on one of his trips outside of St Portwell and “fell in love”. Or, more accurately Maria one sidedly fell head over heels for James. So much so that she put her career as a Professor at MIT (in Mechanical Engineering) on hold to marry him and move to St Portwell. Shortly afterwards, she was pregnant with Trisha and happily gave birth. Sadly this happiness was short-lived as it was only a year later that James had an affair with another woman (that she knew of), resulting in her pregnancy. The events that followed ruined any love Maria had for him and completely destroyed their marriage.

The divorce was messy, and Maria left St Portwell to return to her previous job. Her daughter, barely a year old, was left in the Vanburen Manor in the city. Trisha spent her early years in St Portwell, being attended to by nannies while following around her older siblings. She would visit her mom for a month or two over summer, which involved minimal time together around her mom’s work. But from when Trisha was old enough to understand words, Maria was telling Trisha who was at fault for the situation: her father and his wife after her.

Even in the short period of time they had together, Trisha grew attached to her mom. She took her words as gospel - growing resentful towards her father and making that clear the rare times she saw him, while hoping that one day she could move in with her mom.

There was one thing that Maria wished for when it came to Trisha: that she would excel in school just as she had. So Trisha started learning young from her, and kept this up when she started school. Most of her time was spent locked in her room trying to learn and completely ignoring the family she lived with.

Trisha wasn’t good at school.

No matter how hard she tried, she just couldn’t wrap her head around the most basic concepts. She was near the bottom of the class for learning to read and write, the only thing she was slightly above average for was mathematics. None of it was good enough to satisfy Maria - who even at a distance kept a constant check on how she was doing. It was obvious that she wasn’t academically inclined. It didn't matter that she went above and beyond when it came to effort.

At only thirteen, with her daughter not improving - if anything she grew more mediocre, Maria began to give up. Trisha’s already short visits at her mom’s got shorter and their relationship quickly grew tenuous. Suddenly she was to blame for everything that went wrong.

Trisha started her teenage years filled with bitterness. She was ridiculed by her mother, basically shoved aside by a father she’d always disliked for her better siblings. She lashed out at her siblings and parents whenever she could. It was in one anger fueled moment that she broke into her father’s large collection of priceless artifacts. Maybe if she broke one, she’d get some proper attention from him - even if it was bad, it was better than nothing.

And she did. She knocked over a strange wooden statue… And a strange, bee-like creature was released. She introduced herself as the Queen and, instead of hurting Trisha or fleeing, adjoined with her. Suddenly Trisha could see a world she didn’t know existed, and was thrust into the world of the paranormal. The Queen taught her how to use her new abstraction: controlling the ten thousand bees remaining along with using her pheromones on other people. At first, Trisha worked on getting more bees through a temporary queen, bolstering their numbers.

Between the Queen, the bees, and the friends she made at school, things seemed a little better for Trisha. Then, her dad was tragically killed, completely closing off the slim chance she had of ever reconciling. Soon afterwards, when she was out with a couple of those friends from school, the mall they were in was overrun with apparitions. Both friends were killed, and Trisha barely made it out alive thanks to the help of a group of people calling themselves the Sycamore Tree Coven.

Trisha ended up joining them. At first, she was better with the coven than she was her family. It was another chance for her, to be herself without being in the shadow of her siblings. She made friends with a couple of people, and was included in the rich clique. She saw them as a second family - a place she belonged, even if it was as dysfunctional as her actual family. But she could never escape the Vanburen name, or her own flaws. She isolated as many people as she befriended. She started using her looks as a way to get validation - flirting with coven members around her age, and dating a fair few in the time they were fighting the snake. None of these relationships lasted long, with most ending within days.

One relationship, with a boy a year older than her called Martin Nilsiam, ended especially brutally. They’d been together almost a month at this point - the longest any of the relationships had lasted. In the last week, while they were fighting apparitions, Trisha temporarily lost control of her bees… and this resulted in Martin sustaining life ending injuries in her defence. She made it out alive, and suppressed the memory in response, but some of the other coven members blamed her.

But she stayed, still there when the Stygian Snake was killed and beyond. Trisha stuck around for as long as she could, but she was one of the many high tempers in the covens. She held grudges and got into arguments, pushing towards it disbanding. She stayed until the very end and it hurt more than she wanted to admit when the coven disbanded. So on the way out, Trisha explosively cut all ties with every member that wasn’t part of the rich clique… Severing any chance of a continued relationship.

Trisha moved on. She went to highschool and continued to live in St Portwell as she had done, just on her brother’s dime rather than her father’s. She spent most of her time locked in her room studying even when her grades continued to be mediocre, her mom continued to withdraw, and she continued to use her looks to have shallow friendships and relationships at school. By the end of highschool she did well enough to go to a middle tier university, doing mathematics.

It was at University that Trisha really started to flourish and move on. She got friendly with a guy on her course, Sal, and through him she met his close friend, Cass, and her friend, Reyna. Four more people joined the group, from Sal’s general friendliness and their dorms, making a group of eight. At first Trisha struggled with being herself around her friends, always putting on a fake persona, but eventually it relaxed a bit (but not enough for her to ever truly let them in). In her second year, Trisha and Reyna dated. This lasted for four months before Reyna ended it because it wasn’t working out. It only lasted so long thanks to Reyna’s magic, as a pink & white adept. Unlike all of her other exes, Trisha was able to stay friends with Reyna - partly due to Reyna’s ability to handle Trisha’s bitterness, and to not lose their shared friend group.

Trisha spent the rest of university dating around, spending time with her friends, and studying a shit ton around it all. Each year her already lacking contact with her mom reduced. She graduated with a passing grade, but not much more. The day of her degree result was the last time her mom phoned her. She refused to turn up to Trisha’s graduation and Trisha didn’t invite any other family, so she spent it with her friends and then alone.

With no idea what to do, Trisha moved back to St Portwell. She was lucky that one of her older half-sisters, Sabrina, let her move into her house. She didn’t have to worry about her bees, which she’d been tending to all these years and treating almost like her children. In the past year and a bit, she’s been making money off of odd coding jobs along with an allowance from Ezra.

When the murders started, Trisha responded to Auri’s message with a very succinct ‘fuck off’.

_{Paranormal-Abilities
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"My bees love me unconditionally. I can’t say that for anyone else."

TYPE ⫻ Aberration - Adjoined

ABSTRACTION ⫻ The Hive Queen, Trisha is adjoined with an apparition called the Queen Bee that gives her a hive of bees that she can control along with the ability to manipulate her own pheromones and affect humans with them.

ABSTRACTION DESCRIPTION ⫻

The Swarm ⫻ The primary part of Trisha’s astraction, she has access to a hive of sixty thousand semi-magical honey bees that all view her as their queen. These bees don’t die of ageing, but can be killed easily otherwise (such as being squashed). They also don’t die after stinging, and can heal their stinger back in under a minute. Otherwise, they’re like normal bees. Trisha has to care for and tend to the group of bees to keep them alive.

Trisha can communicate and control her bees just like a queen bee could, through complex pheromonal commands. She can go well beyond what would be possible with mundane bees - giving specific instructions, and can get them to perform complicated tasks as long as she commands them the whole way through it. She can recognise each individual bee's pheromones and can understand what they’re communicating to her, within reason. They don’t speak traditionally and aren’t much more intelligent than a normal bee. It’s possible for Trisha to call them from almost any distance - she can roughly specify how many she wants to come as well. She’s yet to fail to call them. The bees fly to get to her, so it will take their normal travel time to reach her. She needs to be close to them to use other commands. Without specific instructions, they will otherwise go about their normal bee business until called.

Another aspect of the bees is how they increase in numbers. There are two ways of doing this. The first is for a temporary queen to be made, which temporarily reduces Trisha’s control over the hive while they create more worker bees. This was how she grew her hive to its current size. The other way is for the larvae to be implanted into human, or another sentient creature (something that satisfies the apparition’s fussiness), flesh magically. The bees grow and eventually emerge. The human can be alive or dead. Unknown to Trisha, these bees will be much stronger than their normally bred counterparts and have a stronger connection to her. There is also the possibility of creating different types of bees… yet another part of the abstraction she has no idea about.

Pheromone Control ⫻ The secondary part, Trisha can affect humans with certain types of pheromones. Currently she has two types of pheromones she can use on humans: sex pheromones and alarm pheromones. This isn’t an aspect she’s played around with as much, and there is more she could do… eventually.

Sex Pheromones ⫻ A soft, lemony scent, Trisha’s sex pheromones allow her to appear more attractive towards one, specifically targeted person at a stronger level or a few at a much more diluted level. Generally it's most effective when targeted and does very little when not. This makes whoever is being hit by them more likely to want to listen to her, to be with her, to protect her along with being incredibly attracted to her. It makes them easier for her to manipulate if she wishes to, or to get to be with her.

Alarm Pheromones ⫻ A harsher, banana scent, Trisha’s alarm pheromones affecting everyone in a radius around her. This radius is about five metres around her, but the effect weakens the further away someone is from her. These come in two modes: fight or flight. She can choose which one to use when emitting the pheromones. Flight will make anyone smelling them have the overwhelming urge to flee. It will make them want to run out of the area, the effect lingering even when they leave. It can cause complete panic and fear. Fight has the opposite effect, making anyone smelling it much more aggressive or defensive. It increases their adrenaline along with causing them to want to fight, often removing any fear - meaning it can be useful in a fight when used on allies. Trisha can control the intensity of these pheromones within reason, using the flight alarm ones more lightly to alert others to danger without causing panic or going full on against people to cause them to flee.

LIMITS ⫻

The Swarm ⫻ The bees are pretty much normal bees. They gather pollen and create honey, with a few semi frequently checking in on Trisha unless called. Aside from her calling, she’s unable to command them over long distances. They need to be able to sense her pheromones. She can give them commands that require them to go off and do something, which they’ll generally follow. They can easily be killed through magical or mundane means - being squashed, eaten by birds, or hit by any magic. Also the bees don’t always listen to her and the more that she’s trying to command, the more difficult it can be. With smaller numbers it’s possible to give more individual instructions, but the more there are she’ll need to command them in large groups. The bees also need relatively frequent contact with her, and if she doesn’t visit the hive every few days to allow them to sense her queen pheromones they will begin to feel discontent. Gaining more bees take time, and active energy from her.

Pheromone Control ⫻ Emotional fields dampen the effects of these and will eventually be able to tell they’re being used on them. She’s limited by range - someone must be able to smell / sense the pheromones to be affected by them. They affect everyone differently so she can’t always predict what the result will be. Generally she’s protected from the aggression that fight pheromones induce, but not always. The sex pheromones work best when targeted at one specific person, whereas the alarm pheromones can’t be targeted. This means everyone in the radius of around five metres are affected - ally or foe. She has to be within a metre or two of a person for the sex pheromones to be effective. She can only use the pheromones for up to half an hour consistently before needing a break. Sometimes, if her emotions are high or she’s affected by substances, she’ll use these pheromones unconsciously and with very little control of them.

WEAKNESSES ⫻

Whenever a bee dies, she receives a mental backlash; if one or two die, it would be just a tiny headache. If it were hundreds, then she'd be in debilitating pain, with nose bleeds and everything. Trisha's pheromone-based abilities can backfire if she's in a confined space or if the wind carries the pheromones back toward her. This could cause her to affect herself, leading to confusion. Area of effect and elemental attacks are a very effective counter to her bees, as extreme heat and colds are harmful to the bees. Area of Effect attacks can kill large amounts of bees at once. The more bees she controls at once, the harder it is to give specific instructions.

^{Other
_{▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔▔}}
"Kulang ka siguro sa aruga."

Some of Trisha’s bees got shaken around too much in the fight against the Stygian Snake, and now they’re pessimistic.

The.Queen.Bee

A Millennia | The Queen Bee | She/Her "You depend on us to survive, yet you would kill us so easily."

Description: The Queen Bee is an apparition that came into existence a millennia ago. Her existence didn’t come from humans but instead from bees - from the strong bonds between bees within a colony and with their queen, along with their necessity to everything’s survival. She is an apparition that cared most about the bees wellbeing and with it the natural world. She deep within a forest with her own hive of semi-magical bees that she commanded, that also acted as overseers for all mundane bees too - ensuring their safety. She would use her powers to control humans that threatened them or intruded on her domain, forcing them out. But she would also use her potent sex pheromones to lure in select Blind humans, completely bending them to her will and using their bodies to create more bees for her hive. This made her a threat to any civilisation in the surrounding area. Around fifty years ago someone intruded that she couldn’t just control. After a fierce battle, in which she lost the majority of her colony, she was sealed in an amulet. The Queen was used as an artifact for a short while, but she was weakened and the bees difficult to care for. She ended up in James Vanburen’s collection and was found eleven years ago by Trisha Vanburen, who accidentally smashed the amulet and released the Queen. The Queen could have fled, but decided instead to adjoin with her. She sensed in the young girl a need for belonging, and knew that she would look after the remnants of her colony. The Queen was very weak at this point and would need time to recover before she could tend to and grow the hive herself, which had dwindled to only ten thousand bees. But when adjoined with a human she could strengthen herself while passing on the duties. Trisha learned of the magic world from the Queen, and within a year ten thousand bees had become near forty thousand, then sixty thousand by the end of the Stygian Snake, where the population stabilised. At her core, the Queen is an ambivalent to good leaning apparition. Her presence is a boon to the environment and the continuation of the cycle of life, as bees are essential. But she has very little care for humans, with no interest in their life or death. Her bees, and to an extent all bees in the world, are her main concern. She has grown to care for Trisha over the past ten years, as the girl has tended to and loved the bees well. While the Queen is generally silent, she will occasionally talk to or give Trisha advice. Abstraction: Apparition - The Queen’s Hive. The Swarm: At her strongest, the Queen Bee had a hive of almost five hundred thousand bees. Normal bees joined her hive, influenced by her powers and no longer dying to old age. She could communicate with and command all of these bees, to an incredibly specific level. Every bee was connected to her, and interconnected with each other. If she wished, she could control them down to which flower they would pollinate. She did not, because she valued her worker bees as family, but it was possible. She has given Trisha access to this, but a combination of the Queen Bee’s lowered strength and Trisha’s abilities mean it’s more restricted for her. New bees can be born in two ways: through more traditional means, where a temporary real queen bee is created that lays eggs, which then become worker bees. This makes the hive more difficult to control for a short period of time until this queen dies once her duties are done, but they still view the apparition (or her adjoined) as their main queen. This is how Trisha increased the size of her hive. The second is faster, and stronger: luring in people and planting bee larvae in their bodies. This doesn’t require a queen bee, as it's magical. Trisha could technically do this, but chooses not to. Both the Queen Bee and Trisha have agreed for the hive not to grow beyond its current number of sixty thousand. Hive Mind: The secondary part of the Queen Bee’s abstraction, and a much more potent one than her bees themselves. This allowed the Queen Bee to use her pheromones on humans as if they were bees. This could be as simple as using alarm pheromones to induce a fight or flight reaction, forcing people to leave her forest or near complete mind control via pheromones. Blinds were completely susceptible to this, while those with emotional fields could resist. The more complicated the pheromonal command, the easier it is for someone with an emotional field to resist. She is limited by distance - people must be able to sense pheromones. Trisha can only use a fraction of this power, and the Queen is unsure if she will ever be able to use it to its full extent, though she is willing to offer it to her.

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

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Interactions: Sloane via Summon @Atrophy
Kari Wilson’s House

---

Anya was making good, but slow, progress at summoning a larger nightmare. Her hand trembled slightly as she continued to draw a light outline, face tight with concentration. It was tiring and painfully slow to create something this large… but anything smaller wouldn’t be useful. Halfway there.

A disgusting stench wafted up Anya’s nostrils, and she scrunched her nose up. Nausea tried to break her concentration and she pushed it down. She’d visited plenty of unpleasant smelling dreams, such as Luca’s - filled with rot as far as the eye could see. But this wasn’t coming from Luca, or a dream…

Ah. Through the rain Anya caught the shadow of the undead monster, rotting flesh growing more pungent in the air as it played with a jacket right beside the tree she was crouching behind. Concentration broken, Anya bit down on her lip and pressed up against the tree. As long as she stayed on the other side of the tree and it stayed distracted by… was that Sloane’s jacket? Anya’s eyes narrowed. Object of obsession.

She needed a way out of this.

Her summon was interrupted, and she had no practical spells. She needed it directed elsewhere - or for someone to shield her so she could get out. Preferably Stormy. But she couldn’t move out from where the thick tree trunk protected her. Anya closed her eyes, deep frown creasing her lips.

Another summon. A small, quick one, from her own dream. It had been less than two hours since her nap.

Making careful, tight movements, Anya drew her fountain pen in the air right in front of her - soft glow shielded by her own body and the torrential downpour. She sped up the normally two minute long casting by only summoning one small creature, rather than multiple. In front of her a small, foxlike shadow creature formed. She furrowed her brows, quickly getting it under her control.

Find Sloane, direct her to me.

Sloane was the only one the creature would be able to seek out - the only person they’d been around before. Anya just had to have faith that she’d send someone to get her out of this unfortunate situation that… Sloane had caused. Or, that the security team Ezra had assigned to her was in the area.

The little shadow creature scurried out from behind the tree, through the undergrowth. It blended in with the dim light and the rain, quickly seeking out its target and running as fast as its small legs could carry it. As soon as it reached Sloane it stood up on its hind legs - reaching her knee - and tugged her pants. Sloane would recognise it as one of the creatures Anya regularly summoned to help set up her shop, which Sloane had witnessed a few times. As it tried to get Sloane’s attention, it also pointed towards the tree Anya was hiding behind - right where the undead creature was playing with the jacket.

---

Maya Choi

Interactions: Ken @AtomicEmperor, Lynn @NoriWasHere
Kari’s House

---

Out of defiance for being used as a glorified megaphone, and being separated from Phoebe, Maya just watched the fight for a while. Two naked, burning women were duking it out with George and Vashti - she was surprised Emily didn’t die on the spot from their lack of clothes - and everyone else was in chaos. Emily had some kind of plan, but she hadn’t really paid much attention to it.

Ah, well, she should probably fight someone. That would be easy enough to do from the safety of the grotesque creature’s leg. No problem-

HOLY SHIT!

A bullet in the form of a person shot through the thigh Maya had been hiding behind. Thankfully it didn’t hit her- or any of them. Her head snapped around to watch Kenshiro slam into the ground and just keep going. She was almost impressed, if she’d cared enough to be impressed.

But he and the girl he was talking to were behind the creature. Maya couldn’t for the life of her remember the stupid plan Emily had but… Vashti had already run off, so what did it matter? Maya really didn’t want some flying asshole turning around and destroying her from behind. She wasn’t into that.

”...Lynn Serenelight... Choose!"

Ken

Maya snapped her finger, causing Ken’s words to echo out in a jarring screech that would hurt his and Lynn’s ears. “Awww, that’s so sweet! You really should jump in that hole, so you survive and search for your dead little girlfriend! I have to say, I can see why she went for you both.”

Maya winked at them both, lips curving into a devious smirk. Oh this was going to be fun. One was clearly a weakling, one not so much. It had been so long since she’d had a proper fight. Even if one of them was sobbing and the other was overly dramatic in how he talked.

“Butttt… I’m afraid I can’t let you leave. So just get in the hole and watch. Or you can join in if you want, I'm not fussy- but I don't think you can handle me. You, on the other hand,” Maya grinned at Ken, expression playful, "definitely can."

Maya clapped her hands together, a reverberating shield of solid sound forming around her. The sound of the rain thudding against the ground, the fire crackling in the background, and Emily's irritating shouting reduced in a bubble around her in sync with her fingers tapping together - catching Ken and Lynn, but not extending far outwards. She then thrust her hands forward, shooting a blast of screeching sound directly at him. If it hit, it would be like being slammed by a wall of solid air, that both caused ringing in his ears and knocked him back.

---

Interactions: No one she’s playing dead
Kari's House

---

At first, Linqian felt excitement and adrenaline pulsing through her veins as she managed to pull Vashti down to the ground with her. Mud cooled her back, but her front was burning hot and only increasing in temperature everywhere they were touching. She smirked at the feeling of clothes smouldering and melting underneath her, skin burning and boiling.

A loud crack interrupted her satisfaction, hard skull smashing into her face again and again until her grip loosened around Vashti, legs falling against the floor. Pain exploded from her nose and outwards, black spots dancing across her vision as everything went fuzzy in front of her. Blood trickled down her chin, instantly coagulating. Her nose was probably broken. Shit.

Thank fuck for Aryin’s part of the spell, or she’d be knocked the fuck out! But her head was spinning, eyes unfocused and unable to tell exactly what was up or down. She couldn’t move. Vashti’s claws were coming for her throat, a second time, and she couldn’t do anything about it.

There are worse ways to die. At least Huanyi will be taken care of…

As Linqian accepted her death with a pained smile, cold mud splattered all across her face where it should have been her hot blood. She didn’t- couldn’t- struggle when Vashti covered her mouth and pulled her hair in a way which was far too hot for the current situation. Her breathing grew heavier- not just from the adrenaline- and her eyes darkened. Shit, not the time to think of things that way…. Oh, but it was such a shame. Such a shame when all she whispered in her ear was to play dead, before climbing off her.

To get another chance at what? Living? Not something she was so fond of. At Vashti? Now, that was much more appealing.

She’d go along with it just now. Vashti had made it look realistic enough, right? Everyone would assume she was… well, it was a problem for people on her side. Not so much for the other. She’d wait for the right moment to strike. A surprise attack.

And Aryin would know she was fine. Too hot to handle was still active - if her life was extinguished, so was the burning heat.

Linqian closed her eyes, struggling to keep them open as the cloud filled sky spun above her. Her still head felt like it was swinging in circles, nausea clawing its way up her throat, but for the amount of hits she’d taken… it wasn’t that bad. She was just real fucking dazed, light-headed with her thoughts all murky.

She probably needed a healing spell to sit up anytime soon. Fuck, why had she neglected her magic all these years?! Jinhai had even tried to teach her his self-healing, but it hadn’t really worked for her… but she could’ve made it something that did! She was really regretting that now, fuck.

It was fine. For now she’d just lie here. There was a green glow in front of her - a shield. Shit, well, as soon as the whole world stopped spinning she’d get back up and keep going… Until then, she’d play dead. Moving would only result in her falling back down anyway.

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

---

Interactions: Drake @Punished GN, Sully @Atrophy
Kari’s House

---

When the house went up in flames, Luca immediately knew he couldn’t get away fast enough. His legs felt like lead, weighing him down as he tried to limp forward. The fire licked outwards and against him, searing his dark jacket. He shook it off before it fully caught alight, managing to step just out of the flames even as the heat began to burn him.

”Run.”

Clancy

Luca just registered strangely cold fingers pressing against his shirt and skin, and the oppressive heat of the fire behind him burning his fragile skin. It was like everything went in slow motion as Clancy pushed him - watching the kid burning away as he fell backwards. Run... he wasn’t going to be able to run when he hit the ground. He twisted himself as best he could to reduce the risk of snapping his neck. He’d break multiple bones, but it would be alright-

There weren't the expected loud cracks as he landed… in someone’s arms. Luca grimaced, the much softer impact and stop not hurting him anymore than he was already hurt. The burns hurt, but what caused him more distress was the rotting of Drake’s flesh everywhere Luca touched. He hated this. He hated hurting everyone who came near him, and being so vulnerable.

”Thanks,” Luca said, head snapping to the side at Lila’s scream. His eyes widened as he watched the wings forcing their way out of her back, flesh splattering across the people near her. It looked horrible, it looked so painful… And Luca could tell immediately that it wasn’t Lila in control anymore. At least not fully. His heart sank.

But what could he do to help her? He could barely even move.

When Sully appeared, he was able to give a smile slightly less forced than Sully’s laugh. As much as everything was going to shit, at least there were people here he could depend on. Drake, Sully… Jasper, wherever he was. They could get through this together. ”Yeah, you gotta have that super soaker around me, you know how clumsy I am!”

He drank the elixir as quickly as he could, practically guzzling it, while trying to avoid touching the chalice too much. It made it messier, red liquid trailing down his chin, but he avoided properly eroding any of it… it just started to rust. The burns across his body and the painful scrapes from when he’d fallen healed. He felt better than he had in days. He could tell the elixir wasn’t enough to fix any of the damage the Rot was doing to him - something he’d expected, otherwise there’d be an easy fix to his problem - but it helped the aches and pains that came with it.

”Thanks, guys,” Luca said to both of them. He carefully got out of Drake’s arms, standing much more easily than he had before. Not quite painless but… the bearable kind. Now that he wasn’t concentrating on the burning he could feel the Rot weakening within him, catching sight of the glowing green around Drake.

Luca took a few steps back, both to get Drake out of his aura and to avoid Phantombane. He didn’t want the Rot forced out today. Without it, there was almost nothing he could do… And he was still just as frail.

Either way, he wasn’t in a position to fight. It didn’t matter that he had one of the most damaging abstractions here when all it took was a light shove and a wrongly angled fall to snap his neck. His body couldn’t handle it, and he couldn’t bring himself to hurt most of them. But he did know 8th Street better than anyone else here.

”The person who created the undead creature isn’t there,” Luca said to the two of them, glancing over at Linqian’s prone body. Shit, was she even breathing? Drake could probably just run in there but… maybe if he shared a bit of what he knew it would help. ”She’s probably… behind that ice wall. And it won’t matter how much you hurt it, because Carol will just keep healing it. She,” Luca pointed to Maya, ”has sound manipulation and can shoot sand at people. She has range, so be careful. You know what Emily and George can do… I don’t know the other two, they joined after I left.”

He frowned. ”I’m more worried about how many aren’t here.”

Greta, Nadine, Brianna, Lee, Malik, Phoebe… Cynthia. There was a lot of people not visible, which worried Luca. Greta and Brianna weren’t really fighters, but the rest. It made him feel like there was something else going on, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on it. Maybe he was just overthinking things.

”But we need to…” he trailed off, grimacing. He didn’t want to suggest this, because of the six here, Carol was the only one he cared about. But he also cared about people on this side. ”Get Carol away from the creature.”

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

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Interactions: No one specific
Kari Wilson’s House

---

Anya didn’t think much of Jack’s warning about 8th Street coming. When did Evelynn’s predictions work out? Though, after the recollection showing them looting the house, it was better to be safe.

The basement wasn’t the safest place to be. There was no escape route. There was no way-

*BOOM*

Anya grimaced. She followed Britney up the stairs- though not quite as quickly, and ended up in the doorway. An undead monstrosity… Emily G. Reed. What a surprise, Evelynn’s little prediction had come true. This wasn’t a situation Anya wanted to be in. She had no reason to fight 8th Street. In fact, she would quite gladly hand over Lila.

But Britney was going to be a problem, unfortunately. If she was handed over, tortured and killed, there would be nothing to hold Greyson back. He’d likely go on a killing spree, and their little plan would go up in flames. While Anya wasn’t one to place all her bets on a single game, it was a future she quite liked.

Not leaving, then.

Anya moved out of the doorway and house as Luca approached, avoiding getting caught in his aura. She moved slightly around the house, outside but sheltered by it slightly as the light drizzle increased to a downpour. She needed somewhere to safely summon-

The house caught alight, and a large fireball flew past her. Anya crouched down, arm going over her head to protect herself from the light debris that flew down onto her. She was out of the house, far enough away to not be hurt, but… Sloane was still in there. The one person Anya perhaps cared about surviving.

But not enough to sacrifice herself.

What could she do in a burning building, anyway?

Anya moved away from the house as quickly as she could, and into the forest. She crouched down behind a forest, carefully brushing back her long hair so she didn’t look too undignified. While it might look like she was running away to most, that wasn’t the case. To most of the coven’s knowledge she had no spells that could be used in a fight. Her spellbook had been much smaller and rudimentary there. It was only after leaving- being kicked out of- the coven that she’d been able to tap into her gold lux.

She had hoped to save it for another time, when she could truly show it off. But there were two people who knew about her summons: Sloane and Greyson. Greyson wasn’t here yet, but once he was… Ah, well, she didn’t want to deal with questions from either of them about why she didn’t do anything.

It was a waste of time she couldn’t be bothered with.

Thankfully, the last two nightmares she’d visited gave her quite the creatures to select from: Stormy’s and Linqian’s (who somehow had a nightmare immediately after an erotic dream). Linqian’s had heavily featured werewolves - something that Anya had witnessed in enough of her nightmares, along with simple dogs, to know it was a fear of hers. Linqian was working for Greyson, and inadvertently taking her out would remove another body between Anya and 8th Street.

Stormy’s it was then. Hopefully his mental walls were as strong as his magical ones.

Anya pursed her lips, eyes narrowing in concentration. She gently moved her fountain pen, slowly tracing a soft, glowing purple outline in the air. The soft light only lasted a few seconds as she continued down, tip of her pen glowing. With the size of the summon she was attempting, it would take her five minutes of complete concentration to bring it into existence.

Hopefully she would be able to complete it.

---

Interactions: Vashi @Atrophy
Kari's House

---

Shit.

Linqian winced at the tight grip on her wrist as the rain got heavier and heavier, sizzling off her boiling skin and cooling it. She was still super fucking hot, hot enough to burn and hurt, but no longer metal melting temperatures. Her ability to tank hits was reduced too.

She hadn't thought about Vashti's storm when she started this fight!

But she could still take more of a punch than normal.

”Can't pretend I don't want to see them,” Linqian shot back, anger boiling over just at the mention of Bianca. Bianca had never been close to Vashti, when did she tell her that? She’d loved her and that fucking bitch talked about her like she- fuck, pay attention.

Her own distraction was enough to miss the feint, arms moving up in front of her face to try block the mud thrown in it. It splattered across the heated surface, sizzling, and through her arms across her face. Linqian squinted, visibility dulled by the rain and the mud-

Vashti's elbow slammed right into the arms in front of Linqian's face, the momentum smacking them into her head. It fucking hurt, it disoriented her, but the increased durability and arm protection kept her awake and aware. And the pain- well, the pain was fucking good. It helped keep her mind clear, fighting through the dizziness even as she slipped back on the mud covered floor, feeling her legs starting to slide out from under her. She was going to fall. Fuck-

Linqian’s arms came down and forward, trying to grab onto or wrap around Vashti. At the same time her lips curved into the closest to a seductive smile she could manage while falling backwards. Anything to bring her down with her. She needed to touch Vashti - not in the kinky way, as much as she really fucking wanted that, but to do as much fucking damage as she could before retreating. If she managed to get Vashti on the ground with her, Linqian was going to fight through the fucking pain and get as close to her as possible - legs and arms wrapped around her, bodies pressed close together, heating them both up until they burned.

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

Interactions: Emily @Punished GN, Vashti @Atrophy
Kari's House

---

”The fuck,” Aryin said as she watched Jack suddenly appear. She always found that kind of magic to be extremely concerning. What would stop a teleporter from doing something shitty? She made a mental note to buy a fucking bell and force Jack to wear it so that he can at least announce his presence instead of just appearing. She raised an eyebrow at what he said. 8th street was going to attack? And Lynn, that fucking cunt LYNN, predicted it so? Who the fuck cared? Aryin knew Lynn as an unreliable, unstable, piece of shit back in the old days. And from what she’s learned Lynn is still that unreliable, unstable, piece of shit who talks shit about her dead friends and drinks to hide away herself from the pain of her own existence.

”I guess we’re going to be safe today if that bitch is predicting shit again,” Aryin joked and elbowed Linqian as she did.

”Fucking hell, what an attention seeking bitch,” Linqian rolled her eyes. As if anything Lynn predicted came true. She was a waste of space. She should just stop fucking breathing, because someone less shit could be using that oxygen. Fucking bitch. ”Jack’s fucking stupid for believing it- and he’s meant to be the smart one! Well, y’know what, sometimes you need a little less brains to actually be fucking sensible.”

”You’re so right,” Aryin said as her thoughts remained nothing more than the sound of a gentle wind and nothing else, “do you remember all the shit she messed up? Like who even decided she was worth saving? And why was she invited back? She could have gotten so many people killed if we just blindly trusted her predictions,” Aryin crossed her arms as she looked around, “I bet she realized she fucked by saying what she said and it’s going to just flood us with predictions. Don’t drive down Main Street it’s still closed due to the crater, don’t buy the chicken dinner tonight it will be under cooked,” Aryin scoffed as she threw her hands up.

”Don’t talk to Sloane, she’ll be a bitch to you,” Linqian added mockingly, sneering. Then, she paused, and had a thought. ”Wait. You’re not buying yourself dinner all the time, are you? Come on, that’s fucking expensive, and unhealthy… Fucking hell, Aryin, do I need to teach you to cook?”

“Not all the time but,” Aryin paused as she rubbed the back of her neck, “It’s just gotten more expensive to cook at home than to order something shitty from the fast food joints you know? Living on my own has been fucking expensive man,” Aryin sighed as she looked over to Linqian, held her fingers in the shape of a gun, put it under her chin, and jerked her head back as she made a gunshot sound.

”Tell me about it, shit’s fucking awful,” Linqian shook her head. ”Look, maybe I could make you some like… packed meals. I make a shit ton for me and Yi-er anyway, wouldn’t be much extra effort. You could just-”

*BOOM*

”What the fuck?!” Linqian spun around, one hand going to her back and grasping the gun. She didn’t quite pull it out or run for the basement stairs… turning back around to look at Aryin with a frown. ”I’m not hearing shit, am I?”

“No you’re not,” Aaron responded. He looked down, back up to Linqian, and back down to his body. The sudden explosive boom made him swap uncontrollable it seems. ”I hate when it does this,” he paused as she swapped back. This was one aspect of her power that she could never quite master, despite it being the aspect that she worked on the most over the years. She sighed annoyed at the swap and shook her head. ” That could’ve been anything though, I doubt it was 8th street. There’s no way Lynn was-” a moment later she heard her voice for the first time, and an anger began to brew in her core.

”Emily…fucking…Reed,”

Linqian gritted their teeth, dark eyes flashing with anger. ”That fucking bitch.”

She wasn’t actually talking about Emily. She was talking about Lynn, making a fucking correct prediction for once in her fucking life. What an asshole! Linqian could just imagine her smug face and she wanted to burn it off. But there wasn’t fucking time for it. Her eyes narrowed as the shouting upstairs continued… And Britney was mentioned. ”Fuck- I don’t give a fuck about most of these dicks, but not fucking way are they getting Britney. I’ll lose my fucking job! No, actually, Greyson will probably fucking shoot me- also I like her. Fuck.”

Linqian clenched her fist. Should she get out the gun, or- ”Hey, fucker, you remember the spell we used to always use?”

”Oh,” Aryin chuckled, ” oh I do. We’re too hot to handle, remember?” Aryin joked as she remembered the weird kid, ” If we can find something to cover up while we get into position I think Emily will fucking lose her mind seeing us like that again,” Aryin smiled a devious smile as her eyes scanned for anything that could cover her body once she stripped down. If it was just the coven she would say fuck it, they’ve all seen her naked before. The problem was that weird kid. She did not want to expose herself to a literal child. She spotted a linen closet nearby and quickly opened it, and grabbed a few sheets. She tossed one to Linqian and walked next to her. ”Shall we change?”

”Fucking-” Having a sheet thrown at her gave Linqian flashbacks to the halloween party, but this time she caught it with her hand rather than her face. She pushed those annoying memories aside, and grinned. ”Let’s fucking do it.”

Linqian pulled off her fleece jacket first, unclipping her waist holster and shoving the gun in a pocket. She then bundled up her jacket so it was hidden. She didn’t want to melt it, but she also didn’t want anyone else getting it. She then very quickly stripped everything else off, not really giving a fuck about revealing anything, before pulling the sheet around her chest and securing it as best she could. Her clothes were kept in a messy bundle in her arms. ”I ain’t leaving my shit down here- wouldn’t put it past someone to fucking steal it… Let’s go up.”

Aryin followed suit. The first step was swapping back to Aaron to make everything was a little bit less form fitting and making the strip down process easier. He took off his top, and then his bra, and then threw the sheet overtop his frame and covered his bottom half. He kicked off his shoes, and then quickly pulled off the rest of his clothes and quickly bundled them in a messy, but contained, pile that he carried under his arms. He swapped back, looked at Linqian and smiled, ” That cunt probably forgot what we can do.”

Aryin ran upstairs and placed his clothes on the couch in the living area before they found themself near the door. She looked to Linqian and smiled. ” You ready bitch?”

”Always, hoe,” Linqian smirked back, clothes dumped beside Aryin’s (gun hidden among them). She narrowed her eyes at the looming monstrosity, then the actual target. Emily. ”We’ve gotta get close first. Let’s fucking make some noise, cuss her out, and get in front of Britney. Then we do it, cause I’m not fucking slow walking all the way over there.”

“We’d look so fucking cool doing the slow walk though,” Aryin whimpered before she agreed, “but I agree. We’re protectors, let’s fucking show that cunt that were too hot to handle.”. Aryin used one hand to throw open the door, and the other grabbed Linqian by the hand and pulled her through the door, ” let’s give that bitch a fucking show.”

”Oh, we’ll give her a show, alright,” Linqian laughed. She didn’t lose any time pushing through the rest of the coven, right to the front. She made sure they were as up close to Emily as they could get without being insta-hit by George, posturing right in front of Britney (but far enough away from weedy Luca, strangely in front of her too, to not get hurt).

”Look who it is, the pettiest fucking bitch in the city!” Linqian sneered, rolling her eyes at Emily. ”You’re not taking anyone, so fuck back off to the hole you came from.”

Aryin smiled as she looked Emily up and down. ” You’re as pathetic as I remember. Was the thrashing you had the other day not enough? Is Emily fucking Reed a fan of getting her ass kicked? And the rest of you, y’all okay hate criming someone? Carol?”

She then tilted her head, lips curving up into more of a suggestive smile towards Vashti. ”This isn’t what I meant by call me, but… make sure to watch closely.” She gestured down her sheet clad body, covered just enough to be decent, before turning towards Aryin. Her hand balled into a fist. ”Lets fucking go.”

Aryin said not a word, instead she turned and faced Linqian and pulled her first back. A second later two fists were flying through the air, finding homes in the stomachs of Linqian and Aryin. Aryin focused their strength, durability, and their raw ability to hold the line and channeled that magic into her fist as she impacted with Linqian. At the same time, Linqian put all of her energy and rage into a molten heat that had her fist glowing as it slammed into Aryin.

A bright, orange light coated them both as they turned hot enough to melt steel. The sheets burned to a crisp, nothing remaining… but they were both so hot that they glowed orange, and it was near impossible to see anything.

Linqian grinned, turning back to face Emily and her croneys. She’d missed this feeling, the combination of her own powerful heat and Aryin’s tough skin. It was fucking amazing. She shifted to a slightly lower posture, fists in front of her.

”Vashti’s mine, I want a piece of that hot ass- you take George, throw him across the fucking forest,” Linqian narrowed her eyes. ”The rest can take Emily.”

”Yes ma’am,” Aryin said with a fiery grin as she pushed herself as fast as she could towards George, cocked back her arm and threw a punch.

”Heyyyy, hot stuff,” Linqian rounded on Vashti, fist cocked back. ”Prepare to get real fucking hot.”

Then she sent a searing punch towards Vashti’s chest.

---

Interactions: Emily, Carol, Britney @Punished GN
Kari’s House, Patio

---

Luca was relieved when Ken appeared, before Jasper could run over and help him up. Ken could help him without hurting him. Luca even smiled at the bubbling feeling of the telekinetic hug - familiar, warm. The closest thing to physical contact he’d gotten until Stormy made the rot flee a few days ago. He was happy to properly see him.

That was, until Ken started talking about it being war. No. They shouldn’t fight. They should leave. Jacqueline had said they should run, and she was right. Luca knew how strong 8th Street could be. They were cohesive. They had nearly ten years together! Whereas this group fought even while getting attacked…

And to tell the Rot that it could have its day? To let it out? It wasn’t that simple. Ken knew better than anyone how sick the Rot was making Luca. Not that it was killing him, but he’d seen Luca on the days he could barely get out of bed. Letting the Rot out, properly, could kill him. Letting the Rot have what it wanted would only make it stronger.

”Wait, Ken, we should lea-”

He was gone.

Luca looked at the clone in his place, and let out a soft sigh. It was fine. Hopefully they’d be able to talk it out! Yeah. It didn’t need to be a fight. There was no need for that. Everything could be resolved peacefully-

*BOOM*

Shit. Luca’s eyes widened as a horrible undead creature loomed over them, gaze moving down to the people below it. Emily, George, Vashti… shit… Aaron, someone he didn’t recognise, Maya, Carol. The first three were difficult enough to handle, but Carol could heal everyone constantly. All they had was Sully. In Luca’s eyes, this wasn’t a fight they could win.

And he was an incredibly optimistic person.

Taking a deep breath, Luca moved closer to the front of the group. He ignored the aching of his legs as he moved, and the echoing laughter of the Rot in his ears, whispering for him to let go. To discard niceties and just destroy. He couldn’t do that.

”We’re not handing them over, Emily,” Luca shook his head, smiling as if there wasn’t a massive monstrosity looming over them. Like this was just a nice chat, rather than an attack. ”Can’t we talk this out? Was there any need for all of this?”

He knew deep down that they couldn’t. Not with Emily. He couldn’t reason with Emily. It might be possible for the others… but he had to make sure the two they wanted were safe. Lila would be protected by Jasper and Lynn, at least. Maybe Adora too. But Britney? So many people would gladly hand her over.

Luca couldn’t allow that. Even after everything she’d done to them, she didn’t deserve death. She deserved worse.

Likely surprising everyone, Luca moved himself to be directly in front of Britney. Decay her. Far enough in front his aura didn’t touch her, but still obviously placing himself between 8th Street and her. Rot them to their bones. He held his bare hands out in front of him.

”Carol! I know you hate Britney- I understand. She ruined our lives… but killing her won’t fix that!” Luca shouted, coughing as soon as he raised his voice. He could feel the Rot inside of his mind, pushing at him to just give in. Destroy them. He didn’t want to hurt anyone. Betray them, kill her. They could still talk their way out of this. There had to be a way to get out of this without hurting anyone- just turn them all to dust.

”She can help fix you. She can probably help us all, but none of us asked! Killing her won’t change things- because Emily’s not going to help you! So please, don’t do this. I don’t want to fight any of you.”

He then turned his head to look at Britney, brown eyes growing mournful even as his smile remained. Seeing her still hurt, it brought up all of those feelings he’d processed and moved on from. The things that held him back from living his remaining years in peace. But he’d accepted his own fate. Coward. He wasn’t going to watch someone else lose their life. A life for a life just ended with them both dead.

Luca lowered his voice, speaking to Britney for the first time in ten years. ”You should run.”

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

Figured I'd share these Linqian joint-casts from the Stygian Snake era - I also have some ideas of ones she could develop in the future with others (/ have discussed some)
And also some for Anya, Ella & Saskia but... one of these might be used soon

Linqian Joint-Cast

_{Developed During Stygian Snake Fight}

Too Hot To Handle ⫻ A joint-cast between Linqian and Aryin Thorne, which turns the two of them into super-heated, super-durable fighting machines. They both punch each other in the gut, at the exact same time, to combine their green lux to like physical walls that can tank near any hit. At the same time, Linqian infuses them both with her red lux to turn them super hot - so hot they glow as if they were made of magma. They're hot enough to melt metals, and durable enough to tank physical and magical hits... While also being burning hot to touch. This makes them both incredibly dangerous, in both offensive, magma hot punches and wall like defence. This spell does burn of their clothes.

Limits ⫻ Aryin and Linqian can keep up this spell for about fifteen minutes total. Their body temperatures go up to about to about 1200°C (melts most metals). While they can tank most hits, something can eventually get through. The heat is solely dependent on Linqian's red lux, if she's taken out that aspect is removed. Aryin can't store energy from hits taken in this state. Linqian can't use her air temperature manipulation for cold temperatures in this state.

Hot & Penetrating ⫻ Joint-cast between Linqian and Bianca Manalo, the two hug or kiss to allow Bianca to super boost Linqian's abstraction while Linqian super heats (or super cools) herself. This allows Linqian to deliver one super strong attack that completely penetrates emotional-fields, meaning it could feasibly kill another paranormal. This is an incredibly potent spell, but one that can physically hurt them both if the casting fails.

阴阳 (Yin-Yang) ⫻ A Joint-Cast between Linqian and her now-deceased twin brother, Jinhai. The two place their palms together as Jinhai turns super cold and into ice while Linqian turns super hot. This diametrically opposed, with Linqian at near metal melting temperatures and Jinhai far below freezing. The two are unaffected by the others temperature, and can do powerful combined cold-hot attacks such as freezing someone then instantly turning the ice into burning vapour. They completely balance each other out in these forms, and can remain in them together for fifteen minutes. They need to stick close together for it to be effective.

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

---

Interactions: The Cold, Hard Ground, Auri @Punished GN, Jasper/Lila @NoriWasHere
Kari’s House, Patio

---

Luca got a reply from Jacqueline pretty quickly, which he opened immediately.

From Jacqueline: We can talk later. You and Sycamore need to get out of there now! Emily is about to attack you all at Kari’s house.

Shit. Luca’s control slipped and the phone disintegrated in his fingers, blowing away as dark specks in the light breeze. He’d need to transfer his number again, then get her number back on it and text her- No, fuck! That wasn’t important right now! He needed to warn everyone!

Luca shot to his feet, wincing as shooting pains travelled up from his feet all the way to his knees. He stumbled, gritting his teeth and spinning around to shout to Auri and Jasper.

Then he was thrown into another recollection.

He came out of it disoriented. 8th Street had Kari's notes. Whoever destroyed them didn't do it well enough, it was easy for Carol to recover them. But why did 8th Street take them? Why did they need them? Couldn't Jacqueline's book just get them all that information? Shit, the attack-

”We need to go, Emily is-”

Jack appeared out of nowhere, delivering a near identical message. Luca, still reeling from the recollection and physical pain, let out a shocked squeaked. He took a stumbling step forward- and tripped over his own feet, crashing into the ground with a pained cry. He managed to protect his face with his arms, landing not so badly that he broke anything... But there were harsh cuts all over his hands and he could feel the oozing, sticky blood across his arms, legs and torso. It was like his skin had ripped everywhere it touched the ground. Fuck.

”Lynn's vision is right,” he said weakly to the others outside the house, just lying on the ground. He didn't have the strength to get up immediately. ”8th Street are coming.”

Recollections: Under The Sycamore Tree Part. 1

---

Interactions: Britney @Punished GN, Ken @AtomicEmperor
Kari Wilson’s Basement

---

The recollection was… interesting. Anya took a moment to think about it, ignoring the commotion that was the rest of the coven. She did catch Linqian going into Sloane out of the corner of her eye, and Sloane’s subsequent defending of her. Which Anya appreciated, only so she didn’t have to deal with Linqian.

8th Street's mention in the recollection could be disregarded. Anya already knew that they had been trying to recruit Kari thanks to Sloane. But who had Kari joined to protect her from them? Was there a connection to Father Wolf? It seemed likely. Kari had the means to aid someone in killing them.

As they headed towards the basement, Anya briefly turned her attention to Clancy. A child that survived being shot. How intriguing. After they first met, Anya had tried to enter his dreams, with no success. Night after night she tried, but there were no dreams to get into. Almost everyone dreamed, even drunkards like Evelynn on the rare occasion. But not him.

It was curious, and clearly pointed towards him not being human.

The basement was cluttered but Ken had a clear goal for where he was taking them. Anya watched with a raised eyebrow and some amount of awe. It had been a while since they talked, and longer still since Anya had truly seen him use his magic. While the two of them weren’t particularly close, what he showed only confirmed to Anya that he was someone she should become friendlier too.

Because he would be useful. One of the few useful members of the coven, in fact, outside of the large burst of emotion he showed.

Anya inclined her head at Sloane as she rolled her eyes and left - an action that would offend most, but Anya could read the meaning behind it.

”She’ll come around,” Anya said softly to Britney, gaze moving over to the stairs Sloane had disappeared up to make it clear who she was talking to. Of course, she didn’t really believe it. Sloane was unlikely to ever forgive Britney for what she’d done. It was a shame.

She then turned towards Ken, crouching down to get on an eye level with him. She didn’t make a move to physically comfort him - she couldn’t do that, and didn’t want to. Others already had. Britney had gone on about staying positive and hopeful. Anya, on the other hand, was going to take a more logical approach.

”You said that the seals weren’t broken, right, Ken?” Anya started, with a gentle smile. ”Isn’t it more likely that Kari herself took the notes out? Maybe she was adding to them, or reorganising. We can’t immediately jump to the conclusion that they were taken. It would require very strong, subtle magic to get in without you being able to tell. As far as I’m aware, 8th Street doesn’t have anyone with that kind of magic. It doesn’t discount others but… I agree with Britney. Let’s look around the rest of the house.”

She straightened back up and gestured towards the stairs, indicating for him to lead them back up. ”Where’s the most likely place that Kari would leave the notebooks, if not in there? We can start our search there.”

---

Interactions: Aryin @NoriWasHere, Clancy @Zombiedude101
Kari's House

---

"She won't say anything, again- about your brother."

Clancy

”Heh, I won’t let her say that shit again,” Linqian snorted, lips pulling into a thin smile. She was inclined to treat Clancy like the kid he appeared as, joking and thanking him like she did when Henri talked about protecting her as a young boy, but there was an otherness and maturity that stopped her. He looked young, but he didn’t act it. Whether it was due to circumstances or something else, she wasn’t sure. ”But if she says anything while I’m not around, make her regret it.”

She then turned to Aryin, who’d probably overheard it - not that she was bothered by that - and slapped a hand on her friends shoulder.

”Well I haven’t been shot or teargassed yet, so this ones going pretty well,” Linqian replied drily. Every meeting had been a shit show, at least this was a shitshow where they were probably making progress. They had a goal. That was a lot better than just turning up to a stripclub on a hunch, or not even making it out of their new ‘lair’.

They made their way down to the basement and Linqian kept an eye on Clancy - because even if he was a paranormal kid, he was still a kid. Someone had to be the responsible adult here! And it sure wasn’t going to be half the people here.

Layla was high off her tits. Fucking hell. She was not babysitting her again. There was no motivation for that. No expectant little brother or high paying, drug inducing boss.

Her attention turned to Ken’s feat of magical genius. She recognised some of the Kanji, thanks to the similarities to traditional Chinese. Some kind of repeating phrase… she only recognised the words “must” and “pay” from all of them. Honestly, the speed they were going at and the full visual effect hurt her head. She looked away, grimacing. This was Jinhai’s area of expertise. She always left the things that required brains up to him. He’d tried to explain different dimensions and shit like this to her, and she’d zoned the fuck out everytime.

It wasn’t like she could do it, so why bother learning about it? She had way more important shit to deal with. Like work-

And definitely not Ken having a full on breakdown over some notebooks being missing. Holy shit. She understood that it was hard to lose someone. She really fucking did. But this wasn’t the time or place. She looked away, fists clenching at her side. There was a toxic jealousy roiling in her chest at the ease with which Ken could show his grief. How openly he could just cry and wail about it. She would love to be able to do that. Had she even properly cried over Jinhai’s death yet?

No. She didn’t have the time. She discovered his body, and had to deal with all that came with it. Then she had to be there for Henri, she had to move, she had to work to keep them afloat- she didn’t have time to cry or grieve. So she’d put up a cover of emotional numbness to stop herself from processing it at all.

Linqian was jerked out of her thoughts by another fist to her shoulder, tilting her head towards Aryin with a questioning eyebrow raise. She followed her over the wall.

”Fuck if I know,” Linqian frowned. She hadn’t known Kari well at all, but she’d seemed nice. She was part of that weirdo magical girl group filled with nerds proclaiming to fight darkness or some shit. They didn’t seem the murderous type (apart from maybe the edgy one).

But maybe that was all fake. There was no way Linqian would see through that. But Jinhai hadn’t suspected her either. Then again, Jinhai didn’t know about the murders… this was making her head hurt. She wasn’t cut out for figuring shit out. That had never been her role. She was the get pissed at people and punch them person.

”Yeah, I got a bad feeling about this too. Shit’s too weird. Like, the dead Kari being another Kari? Can’t wrap my head around it but that’s a massive red flag… Fuck, what you’re saying makes sense. I can’t think of why, or what the fuck that vision was trying to warn us about, but yeah. Something isn’t right.” She shook her head. ”Let’s stay down here and look, maybe we’ll find something. Wait-”

She turned back towards the main group, speaking louder so they could hear her. ”We’re going to look down here. There’s plenty of places a book could’ve been left, maybe Kari was just using them or some shit. Maybe someone else can help?”

Linqian gestured towards Clancy and Britney - the two she’d be alright with sticking around. Britney she trusted, and Clancy didn’t have any proper connection with living coven members (or Kari). After saying that, she pulled a hair tie out of her coat and pulled her hair back into a messy ponytail.

”Let’s get searching,” she said to Aryin with a wry grin. She started rummaging through one of the shelves, looking for anything that looked like… notebooks. Fuck. There were loads of notes around here. ”Not that I know what we’re fucking looking for! I don’t understand half this shit.”

Understatement, she didn’t understand any of this shit.

She then lowered her voice back to a whisper so only Aryin could hear her, pretending to look so nobody got suspicious.

”You’re definitely right that coming here is probably fucking dangerous,” Linqian whispered, gesturing towards her back where the pistol she’d brought was hidden. ”I came prepared. I’m fucking getting shot again. It’s magic too, or some shit. Dunno, Greyson said something about orange lux infused. Sometimes this shit is more effective than getting up close and personal.”

She shrugged, picking up a book and skimming through it. Stuff she didn’t understand, probably not the notebooks they were looking for.

”I’m not taking any fucking risks.”

---

Interactions: Clancy, Jacqueline Reed (text) @Punished GN
Kari’s House, Patio

---

It was difficult for Luca not to feel guilty when Lila talked about how glad she was that Luca wasn’t with 8th Street anymore. Of course he wasn’t with them anymore, he refused to hurt anyone. But he’d joined a group that Emily was in charge of in the first place. And if the direction and leadership changed… He’d probably rejoin. Though he wouldn’t be abandoning these three friends, even if he did.

He turned his head to Clancy when he asked about the book.

”The book’s still with an 8th Street member, one of Emily’s sisters,” Luca replied to Clancy. Maybe he shouldn’t have mentioned it. He didn’t want to put Jacqueline in any sort of danger. ”She’s really reasonable, so I’m sure she’d talk to us if we asked- and help. I think I still have her number.”

Luca still had the numbers of a lot of 8th Street members - saved on his computer for if he ever needed them. There were a few he added to each new phone: Carol’s, Greta’s and the twins’. Just in case. He never actually contacted them.

But he’d message her about it when he got a moment.

”I’ll stay up here!” Luca waved to Ken’s retreating back. Almost everyone had gone into the basement… apart from Drake and Stormy who’d gone into the woods. After Tayla’s stalker? Luca decided not to think about that much - it wasn’t his place.

He didn’t want to disturb Jasper while drawing and honestly, a moment of peace was nice. Luca was still recovering from the festival, and with that came a lot of pain and exhaustion. He grimaced as he moved over to a large rock, sitting down. His knees creaked slightly as he bent them, but the relief at being sat was near immediate.

Now seemed like a good opportunity to text Jacqueline. He pulled out his phone, concentrating to make sure he didn’t destroy it. Typing was an arduous task - his fingers ached and were incredibly stiff, and his phone was a cheap, shit type that only had the numeral keypad. After quite a bit of time spent typing,

To Jacqueline: Hi, its Luca, can we meet to talk sometime?