[IC] Wingless: From the Cracked-Open Sky (Page 2)

The illusionist’s pale features drained of even the slightest bit of color as she went nearly catatonic with barely restrained anger at the prissy little girl who dared spit out a lecture after a single compliment. You little scank! I’ll be sure to find a place to knock you off your high horse, bitch. Just wait- Even Kathrine’s frustration fueled thoughts were cut off as Lightpost’s commanding tones cut through the air to give the young Overture her much awaited boon. Alone with the princess…? A devilish smirk crossed her features, lighting up the ruby-colored eyes with an expression that flickered between conflicted happiness and barely contained excitement.

There was a skip in her step as she bounced over to Isis, carefully latching onto her newly-assigned partner’s arm with demure grin. “Let’s go find that boy, huh?”

Isis responded to Kathrine’s act of skinship with a swift clock to the head with her water canteen, wearing an entirely unamused expression. The girl seemed unusually enthusiastic for such a hot day. Perhaps she was moved emotionally to find the little lost boy? Saving human lives was a big motivator, after all. Nonetheless, personal space was personal space, and Isis made that clear. She had no personal feelings about partnering up with her; in fact, Isis was quite relieved at not having been partnered up with Rinshan last time. The situation last mission wasn’t very flexible.

“Wait,” said Isis, oblivious to her partner’s intentions. “I think it would be more pertinent to think of a strategy for us to follow so we can be more efficient. I don’t want you to drag down the rescue effort if you collapse from dehydration.”

It took a herculean amount of effort to not sock the younger girl in response to both the swift thump on the head and the ever-continuing lecture. Maintaining a pleasant grin, however, proved to be simple after she bit down the pain and steeled herself for the impending vengeance. Kathrine could almost taste the sweet pleasure that the release of rage would bring, and thus allowed herself a slight chuckle at the vision of Isis’ humiliation.

She came back to reality as her white-haired junior proclaimed yet another insult. With another demure smile, Kathrine lightly trotted over to her fallen parasol and picked it up before returning to her targetteammate. “This should do nicely for the times that the hydration team isn't available, yes? The streams where we’ll be searching for the boy should provide some nice reprieve too.”
--
The younger fae glanced over at the white umbrella with a shrug. It was one of the things about the Overture girl that Isis just could not understand. It was completely useless against shade, held up one hand, and would get in the way of your view. There was no sense in bringing it on a search-and-rescue mission save perhaps for use as a beating stick or radio antenna to amplify signal. In the end, it wouldn’t matter though, she concluded. An illusionist had no business on a search-and-rescue besides for another pair of eyes in the skys. If she could triangulate the boy based on magnetic field, the entire mission might be done within a few hours’ time.

Isis crossed her arms as she continued to lean against the HQ’s colder stone wall, letting the water canteen dangle from a wrist strap.

“That’s acceptable. Just find a canteen and we’ll head out.”

Despite the apparent apathy of the young Juneau’s reply, the disapproving glance was as clear as day. Kathrine turned away and snorted quietly. There was one use for the parasol that Juneau hasn’t considered. Ramming it up her stuck-up little--

Her eyes dropped down as she slid over to the stack of canteens reserved for the hydration team. Giving a small wave and a light-hearted giggle to Rinshan as she passed, the older girl selected one at random and darted over to the tank, filling the metal bottle with the lukewarm water. Allowing herself a single moment of preparatory time before returning to Isis, Kathrine applied her most charming smile and returned back to the HQ’s opposite wall.

“We’re all ready to go, then?”

As usual, Kathrine found her canteen through some unscrupulous means, which prompted a raised eyebrow from Isis but no further action. A functional partner was more useful than passed out partner, after all, and Isis was generous enough to overlook that. She too took a moment to double-check herself, making sure her canteen and earpiece was in order (she didn’t need a radio, naturally), and with a piercing glance, to see if her partner was indeed as ready as she said she was.

“Of course. Let’s take a western track and search the larger bodies of water. We can double back to the hydration team and get a situation report from Carbon and Rinshan after we’ve done a few passes.”

Kathrine’s smile only grew wider as her prey continued to ignore the impending danger, picking up a radio as she sidled past the other woman toward the command base door. It was almost cute. Humming quietly, she focused momentarily on the cool feeling of the crystalline form of her stowed Artificial Wings, willing them into activation.

She braced herself for the slight shock of her Wings unfurling, relishing in the rush as the flowing cloth draped itself over her body. The overly-metallic armor sparked into existence around her throat and shoulders with a cooling rush that pleasantly sat over her skin. The entire outfit seeming to occupy the same space as the sundress for a fraction of a second before overwriting the simpler cloth. It was a curious sensation, to be sure, but the Overture girl had never questioned what happened to the clothes when they disappeared. She’d always figured that it added to the mystique and power of the Fae.

With another skip, the albino girl simultaneously pushed open the entry to the outside and launched herself forward and out the door. She came to rest a few feet out and above the ground, turning to look down on her partner with a demure giggle.

“Are you coming?”

Isis shrugged with a sigh, following Kathrine out the door. The older Fae was being unusually proactive today. Was she suffering from heatstroke? If it made her more willing to perform, then perhaps it was for the better.

Unlike the illusionist’s wings, Isis’ wings were a bit more troublesome to prepare, requiring a decent radius around her as to not inhibit her wings. Following Kathrine out the door, she took a couple dozen paces into the plaza and stood still. For a moment, nothing seemed to happen as the young girl clutched the crystalline pendant on necklace, but within a few seconds, there was a discernible ionization on the surrounding air. A nearby lamppost buzzed even though it was off, and a slight breeze began to pick up, dispersing the stagnant air around them. Little bits of iron dust surrounded Isis, glimmering like fairy dust in the wind before condensing into an array of light on the scorching summer ground. In a snap, the light burst forward into twelve distinct metal plates, horizontally facing the ground like solar panels. With a routine glance from Isis, the blue-hued plates oriented themselves vertically and folded into a thick, but more manageable single shield. Her wings always required a bit more mental management than those of others, but she found in time that managing the plates became second nature to her.

“Of course. Don’t you find that armor rather cumbersome?”

Gods, this woman tried her patience. “Don’t you find that armor rather cumbersome?” Maybe if I work out how to beat her ‘accidentally’ over the head, she won’t be as averse to armor? She snickered at the thought, allowing a single sarcastic remark to slip out as both an answer to herself and to the younger Fae. “I don’t wear a helmet, so I don’t suppose I’m one to talk.”

Shaking herself from her reverie, Kathrine straightened up, glancing around at the other leaving groups. If she wanted to teach this little suck-up a lesson, they’d have to be alone. That was always the failing of her wings. Perfectly real, but only to one person. I can wait.

With a simple flourish and a “Let’s get moving, then?”, she began to skip off toward the nearest body of water she could recall, a small creek that ran through the surrounding farms.

It seemed Isis was right, the heat was indeed getting to the girl. Nobody here wore helmets, so that a bit left-field. She was right though, helmets were a no-go for flying.

Following Kathrine, Isis flipped the plate back horizontally and carefully stepped onto it, suspending herself several feet from the ground with her makeshift platform. She raised her eyebrows with a look of doubt as the older girl moved towards a tall field. Wouldn't the point of deploying Fae over a bunch of villagers be defeated if they weren’t… flying? Goodness, how inefficient could this girl get?

“Are you not going to fly? Skipping around the rice paddies like a little girl doesn't seem like a wholly efficient affair. Lets get into the air and search at a vantage point. A relative altitude of 200 feet would be something reasonable, not zero feet above ground level.”

Although Kathrine filed away yet another strike on the rapidly filling internal chart that measured how much she tolerated the people around her, she complied with the barest minimum of compliant(“Oh, of course, princess”). After another full skip, the illusionist leaped into the air and extended the rest of resting Wings to full flight capacity.

Fragments of distorted air and light twisted around Kathrine’s back, reflecting off the armor and ruffling the gloriously colored cloth that hung loosely around her body. Suspiciously organic sounds bubbled through the air before settling into a low hum that was vaguely reminiscent of a swarm of bees. As the sound settled into its default state, the twisting light and empty air finally settled into a form that was recognizable as another simple circle that orbited the albino girl at high speed.

Ascending quickly past her nagging partner, Kathrine stared down at Isis with a smile that bordered on an emotionless grimace. “Follow me. I’ll be sure to follow your ‘standards’ if we’re going to get to that water and find that boy.” And possibly find a way to stick those metal bits into any of your very exposes fleshy areas.

Now that Kathrine was flying, they could get their mission done. She was flying a bit higher than what was necessary, but Isis would concede that she knew the land here better than her. Since she was cooperating quite well, perhaps they would be able to keep to their schedule and make it back to rendezvous with Carbon and Rinshan to rehydrate and get some much needed intelligence.

Flying standing atop the plate became awkward after a while in the heat. Continuing the follow the older Fae for the time being, she shifted her position into a sitting position off the side of the plate with a slight jump. Reaching for the half-filled water canteen at her side, she unscrewed the cap for some much needed mid-air refueling. All the while, she kept her eyes glued to the treetops, searching for any signs of the boy or a body of water.

The heat was horrible.

Kathrine had never felt so drained in all of her time as a Fae. The disgustingly hot weather that was coupled with the humidity of the moist air that rose of the creek caused droplets of sweat to roll of the albino girls forehead and onto the silvery circlet and armor, forming a rather interesting pattern of shades and flickering sparkles when compared to the orbiting halo of pressurized air and light that kept the older Fae aloft. She’d long since given up on searching the surrounding area in favor of letting her height drop toward the tantalizing glimmer of the creek far below.

Her red eyes darted over to the stoic form of her partner, lingering momentarily as Kathrine briefly wondered if she could knock the younger girl of her perch and into the sparkling water far below. It was quite possible that she wouldn't be seriously injured, and if I activate my power there’s no doubt that she’ll be unsure of why she fell. All it’ll take is just a little… pu-

Again, her dark thoughts were cut of by the timely intervention of her radio coming alive with a burst of static, followed by Felix and his carefree voice reporting his and Southey’s location. Another thought crossed Kathrine’s mind as she processed the information, wheeling around and darting over to Isis. Her next words were lathered in the albino’s sweetest honey tones. “Juneau, we’re going to meet up with Felix and Southey, okay? I doubt they’ll be able to cover the entire river by themselves, and we’ll be able to discuss further movement with them when Rinshan and Carbon get there.”

Isis’ eyes tracked her unusually bubbly partner as she circled around to her position. She opened her mouth as if to say “what now?” but after just hearing the other team’s radio message, she already knew what Overture wanted to say. She narrowed her eyes in disapproval at Kathrine’s proposal. Did she have some sort of attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder?

“We have our orders to stay in two separate groups, Kathrine. I’m sure they can handle their own, and we can share information at the hour when we regroup for water. Unless you have a more compelling reason other than to splash around in a river, we should continue to search for the lake.”

Kathrine’s sweet smile never left her lips as the gears turned behind the perfectly made-up face. “We’ve searched the creek for a bit, and I never said we had to go directly to the river. There’s a bunch of land in between here and the river, making it easy to search for the poor lost child in a wide swath as we go between here and there. If we take our time and carefully search the land, we’ll make it there on the hour and both of us will have completed our duties. Everyone’s happy and we’re complying with Commander Lightpost’s orders.”

The younger Fae sighed, finally acquiescing to the proposal. It wasn’t the best search and rescue tactics, but she knew full well the entire search pattern they were using was fairly arbitrary anyway.

“That’s a broad interpretation of orders, but alright. I suppose it’s doable.”

Kathrine’s girlish giggle of delight was surprisingly pure of malicious intent. Darting in, she moved close enough to wrap her arms around the stoic younger girl(Only for a fraction of a second, the young Overture was in no mood to get yet another strike on the head), before darting off toward the forest that separated the duo from the rest of the search party. It would be simple to spring my plan on her once we get to the river.

“You need to knock off that giggling habit, Kathrine. It’s rather creepy.”

Ignoring her companion,(Perhaps out of spite), Kathrine took off in the lead, more than ready to reach the cool promise of the flowing water.

[IC] Wingless: From the Cracked-Open Sky Page 2

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