Attention

[Carrion Queen]

Her elation at someone complimenting her power faded like someone had rolled back a dimmer switch from “Happy” to “Uh-oh.”

“…and it’s not like it’s dangerous or anything, like…” said Emily.

Like yours.

This was not a girl who is keeping her thoughts off of her face.

“….like some people have,” Emily finished, after a pause.

Ximena thought about this. She had tried to make honesty more of a priority in her interpersonal relationships as of late, spurred on by texting with someone who said they were a psych student on TikTok, which was about the best mental health she could afford. Considering this interaction with Emily, she concluded that she was a dishonest honest person -- someone who was not used to lying or who was not especially good at it who was lying right now. Was that good enough?

“Yeah, some people have it rough,” she responded, turning her smile back on.

It was good enough for now and given the situation. Better a dishonest honest person than a dishonest dishonest person who was adept at deception and not to even go into honest dishonest people.

Ximena nodded and walked a few paces away, shining her flashlight on the ground in a methodical manner, going back and forth until a small area had been covered.

She heard the noise first. There was chittering, pattering, clicking, squelching. Ximena stood up straight and felt her hand get sweaty against the plastic of the flashlight. She whipped the light towards the multitude of sounds and saw that the darkness of the basement floor was undulating, squirming, and skittering. She slapped her hand over her own mouth to muffle a scream as she looked on, wide-eyed. While securing the bag on her shoulder, she tried to get to Emily as fast as she could, hearing some sticky crunching underfoot.

“We have to get out of here,” she said in a wavering voice loud enough to carry over the rustling din. Ximena looked up the spiral stairs where all the bugs were coming from and thought she saw someone near them. Whatever. Whoever it was, it would be better than being stuck down here.

She bent over and shot out a blast of power near Emily, slowing two scorpions that were headed towards the girl. The delicate, shimmering legs of a scorpion continued forward slowly.

Ximena glanced up again and the person was gone. She thought about what would happen if this writhing mass reached the meat room and her face went pale.

Though they probably weren’t there, Ximena couldn’t shake the feeling of bugs being on her arms, chest, legs, and head.

"Come on!"

((Ximena Rodriguez continued in And So It Goes ))

[Skraal]

The rustling and clicking had reached an almost deafening pitch as the floor swarmed with all manner of horrible creatures. Worse than that, there was a horrible noise in the distance, possibly someone screaming, but also possibly the cry of yet even more insects making there way over here. Emily let out a yelp of terror as she began stepping through the horde of insects, with set that she killed seeming to be instantly replaced with more of their fellows.

She gripped tightly to the straps of her bag as she rushed over to the stairs, following the sound of Ximena's voice. The steps themselves seemed to be clearing off as the mass of bugs continued onward to its destination, the sound of scuttling still nevertheless filling the air. Emily stood there for a moment, her eyes darting between the darkness of the room behind her and the rapidly disappearing form of her companion. They still hadn't found what she was looking for down there, and even though the search would be nearly impossible with all the creepy crawlies about the place, the thought of giving up made her feel sick to her stomach.

Eventually, however, the fear of being left alone with the swarm won out over her need to keep searching. She bit down on her lip as she began to ascend the stairs, leaving her bug-covered sleeping back behind on the floor. The light of Ximena's flashlight began to dim as the distance between them increased, forcing Emily to pick up her pace, her footsteps clanging loudly against the metal staircase.

If those bugs ended up blocking off that area forever... well, she didn't want to think about that. At least not right now.

((Emily Chou continued in And So It Goes))