You know, when I made him Kiaba was supposed to be cool and suave. Then he opened his mouth and now he's the biggest dork I've ever played. I regret nothing.
Kiaba kept smiling and looking straight ahead, doing his best statue impression. Once enough time had passed that he was sure the girl was out of range, he relaxed a little.
"Fission mailed everybody, emergency evac required." He muttered to himself. With a small force of will, a floating handmirror swirled into being facing him.
"Smooth moves, kiddo," it said in his own voice. Creating a unique image and sound at the same time was still too much for him to focus on. "Pretty soon you'll be married with seven kids!"
"Shut up me, only I'm allowed to sass me, except for other people who are also allowed to sass me sometimes." Waving his hand through the mirror like blowing away a wisp of smoke, he turned around at a sudden thought.
"Wait, didn't that bell mean something? Like something I'm supposed to be doing?" Noticing most people were flowing in a specific direction, Kiaba shrugged and joined the stream of people, hoping this wasn't the line for the slaughterhouse or Transformers 3.
Just before his song ended, Kiaba noticed when every animatronic ghost around him suddenly snapped to face one direction and chopped their teeth in unison, hands outstretched. Having long since learned to pay attention to signs like that, especially from his freeform creations, he turned in that direction to see what the commotion was about, retrieving his phone and navigating to his 'combat playlist' by touch, his phantoms fading away as he stopped the song. Instead of finding someone trying to sneak up on him however, he instead caught the eyes of another sstudent who seemed to have been staring at him. After briefly considering his options, he shrugged and changed course, walking toward the stalker. "Not like I have anywhere else to be, and everyone knows that making eye contact means you have to have a Pokemon battle." He chuckled to himself over his reference as he drew nearer.
"Hey," he said as he closed the distance, "I noticed you noticing me noticeably, and thought 'I should get to know-tice. I mean them.' My name is Kiaba, what's yours?"
• Name: Alice Painter • Age: 17 • Species: Human • Abilities: -Familiar: The ability to create and animate an imaginary creature. By drawing the image of a creature and infusing it with part of her spirit, she can bring it into reality. The summoned being seems to be intelligent, but lacks the ability to speak and often requires orders to function. The familiar's abilities are determined by the type of creature it is (A living suit of armor will be stronger and slower than a cat), but by average they will be five times as able as Alice herself. She also cannot give them supernatural abilities of their own, like psychic powers or fire breath. Alice can only maintain two familiars at a time, and only for five minutes. • Skills: - Drawing • Other: Alice is physically frail, sometimes even requiring assistance to perform drawn out physical activity, like climbing a long set of stairs.
It was the perfect day. The sun shone overhead, filtering softly through the branches of her willow tree as Alice put the finishing touches on her drawing. The fresh country air did more for her body now than any number of supplements and drugs back in the city. Taking another deep breath, Alice closed her eyes and enjoyed the soothing sounds of nature until she heard a voice calling her name.
"Alice! It's time to eat lunch!" Her mother yelled from the house. Smiling, Alice packed away her supplies and stood up carefully. Then, as she turned to head inside, a menacing shadow fell over her, and the world was darkness and screams.
----
Alice woke with a start, confusion and fear overriding her mind for a few seconds as she scrabbled to get a hand on something solid. Managing to clutch the arm of her seat, she raised one hand to shield her eyes from the sunlight streaming through the window as she fought to control her breathing. "That dream again," She muttered under her breath, reaching over to pull the curtains over the offending sheet of glass. She got a look of the countryside as she did, and saw shops and billboards flanking the highway running parallel to her. Stopping a conductor passing her room, she asked "How long until we arrive, sir?"
"The train will arrive in roughly one hour miss." The man responded, "Is there anything I can do to assist you?"
"No, thank you very much," She replied, smiling at the man as he continued his duties. One hour until she got to her new home. A place where she might be able to put a stop to those dreams, if nothing else.
It was an interesting song to start the first day of school on, but that's what he got for hitting shuffle and putting his phone away. Still, he enjoyed the song and didn't feel motivated enough to change it. As he walked through the crowd, people looking his way might catch glimpses of mechanical horrors floating around Kiaba's head, barely visible and insubstantial. They might as well be tricks of the light, those apparitions leaking from his imagination. He kept hold of them and kept them illusory. He didn't want to hurt anybody by accident.
No, if he was going to hurt somebody, it was going to be on purpose.