ArchivedLogs:Corpses And Horses

Corpses And Horses
Dramatis Personae Jackson, Lia, Kelly, Sugar
In Absentia	19 November 2013 A rough night at the stables. Warning: Contains some zombie-fighting and related gore/violence. (Part of Infected TP.)
Location <XS> Stables
The distinctive smell of hay and sawdust and horses greets visitors to this large barn, kept well-tended by the stablehand and those who have a passion here for equestrianism. The horses at Xavier's are well cared for, stabled in comfortable stalls. The walls host a plethora of tack for those who wish to take a jaunt around the grounds. It's after dinner, now -- venison, again, tonight in a onion-and-potato-y stew -- and this time of year that means that by now it's already /well/ past dark. But also well before curfew, though with the nip in the air and the lingering sense of unease around the school (and really, the /world/), most students are electing to remain indoors where it's warm and well-/lit/. But the moon is bright outside, lighting the grounds in bright silver, and added to this is the bobbing cheerful light of a -- lantern? A floating /globe/ of soft light, illuminated from within by what initially appears to be tiny shifting candles but on closer inspection turns out to be a number of tiny red lizards -- all of which are merrily on fire -- skittering around the clear surface of the bubble. The bubble hovers just behind and above Jackson's also flame-hued hair, lighting his path as he makes the trek from the mansion down to the stables out nearer the woods. He's dressed warm and comfortable, black jeans tucked into tall black boots, a silvery jacket over his rainbow hoodie and brightly coloured mismatched armwarmers on his arms. He slows as he nears the stables, frowning slightly at the door, currently ajar. Lia is out wandering! Well, she isn't out so much /herself/. It's dark and there are zombies afoot. Maybe. She is in her chosen doll of the moment, a three-foot-tall stone girl with butterfly wings appropriated from one of the mansion's gardens. She has heard much about this place's forests and playgrounds and lakes and stables, yet has somehow managed to see mostly /building/. It is a nice building, but sometimes a body wants open space to galavant about in. So it is that the stone faery girl is skipping along when she spots lights. Blinky-lights! One might say /faery/ lights. Her skip-prance carries her over toward the stables. Kelly isn't trying to be a sneaky pants. Still not quite integrated to the school well enough to not want to find quiet places alone, he had taken the opportunity to go visit George and make sure he was finding his new home on the grounds acceptable. George of course being the rather large vine he'd coaxed into climbing the school's walls not too long ago. And the answer is: Yup! George is happy, well, growing well, at least, and decidedly NOT brown. Brown being a bad color, after all. But shining lights and colors crossing the grounds at night? He's way too curious to pass that up. And that becomes doubly so as he sees a quite literal faery cavorting after them! He does his best to suppress a giggle, and begins to sneak off in that direction after them. Because there is no way this is an irresponsible decision, right? Jackson's head turns from the door to the stable at the flickers of motion approaching; there's an instant where he does a double-take at the skipping stone faery but then his expression resolves into a smile. "Hey, Lia." The scurrying salamanders in his lantern cluster to one side, looking down at her. "Gosh, I don't think I ever seen that little faery so cheerful afore. -- Y'been down the stables afore? We got, uh, kinda a unusual --" His head tips up in a nod to Kelly, too, as he pushes his way into the stables. "Sugar, y'there?" He's frowning at the open door, looking around uncertainly. "H'lo?" His voice is quiet, out of respect for the horses, though they're already uneasy. Shifting restlessly in their cells, a few of them actively stamping at the floors in alarm. Sugar is nowhere to be seen inside -- the giant horse-sized dragonfly is currently circling overhead, uneasy herself as she comes down to land back towards the trees. But then take off again and land on the /roof/ at the sound of further footsteps in the trees. /In/ the stables two of the stall doors have been broken in. There's blood staining the hay that's fallen to the floor, quiet wet tearing sounds coming from inside. Jackson freezes, holding a hand up – wait. At the greeting, faery-Lia scampers right up to Jax, nearly at his feet. “Hello, Mr. Fairyjax. I came to see outside more. But it was dark and maybe a little scary, so I didn't send /me/. This faery probably looked less cheerful because she is always reading the same book and there are no words on the pages. I left the book in the garden.” The little faery-head shakes at the question of the stables. “I haven't been, but I wanted to. To see the horses.” She bobs up and down on her toes where she stands, the wings behind her seeming strangely still and stiff for all of the motion in the rest of her. “Oh, hi, Flowerboy. Kellygreen.” Little stone fingers wave as Kelly approaches. When Jax's posture changes and his hand goes up, faery-Lia answers with a head tilt. Curious. More than a touch wary. "I need to learn to sneak better." Kelly says with a small sigh of exasperation, though he wasn't doing that good of a job at it. "But glad it's you two. I was worried it might be ghosts or..." The hand. Wait. Kelly's mouth clicks closed quickly and he nods sharply one time. He closes in tightly to the group moving protectively to Lia. Kelly keeps craning his head to try and get a look inside as best he can, but he keeps getting distracted by... something? Up in the sky? It's a pretty big bird, isn't it? His hair tips back, flowers easily catching the light, and out here his smell would travel rather easy in the crisp air. A sweet smell, with a hint of green. There is some advantage to being your own walking air freshener! "S'a lotta grounds to look 'round, that's for sure. I'm pretty scared'a the dark, too," Jackson admits quietly, as his salamanders flare brighter. One of them scurries straight through the wall of the bubble, hopping down to the ground to dart inside the stables. It skitters along the flood, notably /not/ lighting anything on fire despite the halo of flame it still carries. As it passes by the open stalls, there's a soft rattling from inside. A shifting, a shuffling. "... ain't ghosts," Jackson says, very softly. The salamander inside is growing, bigger now. Cat-sized, beagle-sized. Mastiff-sized. "Y'all might want to not look," he murmurs as he steps closer to the door of the stable. From the woods behind them, off in the dark there is another set of footsteps quietly growing closer, lured by the rich scent of horse-blood, though Jackson's attention right now is largely in the stables. “Why would you sneak? You're allowed to be here,” faery-Lia asserts with a firm nod. But then there is a skittery flaming lizard happening, which is a /little/ distracting. Lia dances her weight from foot to foot, eyes locked on the little creature. “Ooo, you have fire-lizards, Mr. Fairyjax! Are they your pets? How do they get in a bubble?” She quiets at Jax's admonition, ducking slightly behind one of his legs. There are some benefits to being only three feet tall. "Oh gosh..." Kelly says with quite a bit of dread in his voice. And begins to slowly back away from the barn, his toes bristling the grass with each step he takes blindly in that direction. "L-L-L-Lia, why don't you come back here and let Jax take care of the... you know." He whispers to the girl in a slightly frightened stutter as his heart rate begins to go up and up and up., and then up to Jax with some more concern in his voice as he adds: "Y-Y-You... sure you won't need help?" he offers next. He may be scared out of his brains, but that doesn't mean he'll let Jax get eaten if he needs to help. This was one of the few Grown-Ups he's placed in his 'like' column in the world, and would be noticeably missed if brain was eated. "I make them," Jackson answers Lia in a low voice. With the rather eye-catching firelizard frisking about the aisle, one greying bony pair of hands starts dragging itself out of the stable floor. The zombie, once a middle aged man in torn jeans and a leather jacket with one sleeve missing, evidently fared none too /well/ as it took down the horse, legs a broken ruin. The second, emerging from the neighboring stall in filthy polo shirt and khakis, is still upright. Both zombies converge on the salamander, grasping hands reaching for it -- and reaching for it and reaching for it, each grab passing right through. "I'll be aright," Jax murmurs, stopping to press something in the buckles of the black faux-leather wristcuffs and collar that he wears; the jewelry lights up, faintly, with tiny pinpricks of red glow. "Jus' stay calm, 'kay?" Even as he says this, a third zombie, tall and lean and probably once a teenager, dark jeans and one sneaker and a Salem High track jacket on, lurches out from behind a tree in the nearby woods, stumbling right towards the people outside the stables. Jax's back is still to him, eyes fixed on the zombies inside; he lifts a hand and the salamanders are drowned out by a brighter flash of light, one beam shooting straight towards the standing zombie to sizzle a neat hole straight through its head. Lia /could/ move back, but it would require her to let go of Jax's shirt hem, which she has taken up in handfuls in both stony hands. Clearly this is the safest of postures. She peeks out from behind the teacher with just one eye, watching hands go /through/ the lizard. “Oh. Oh, it's not a solid.” All of the goings-on in front of her are /truly/ impressive, as evidenced by the fact that she isn't pawing at Jax's light-up jewellery. She clutches tighter at the sight of suddenly holey-headed zombie. "Lasers." Kelly says, seeing the flash of them but trying rather hard not to see the unfortunate outcome of it, as instructed. Still, he's glad the teacher is there to make things better. Back one step... back another... "Stay calm, stay calm, stay calm..." he whispered lightly to himself in a quivering voice. The light of the flashes and lizards drawing back from his skin as he gets further from it. Bump. Jerking quickly around, Kelly comes face to face to the third track zombie belting out a quick: "Ah!" Followed by "Staying Calm! Staying Calm! - - Jax!" as he tries to clumsily reverse course despite being within arm's reach of said zombie. Jackson whirls hastily at the sound of alarm from Kelly. The other zombie in the stables is dragging its way towards the door, but without the use of legs this process is slow. Jax's arm drops to rest around Lia's stone shoulders, his brows knitting together as a shimmering prismatic wall blossoms between Kelly and the zombie's grasping hands; they thud against the translucent but very solid surface futilely. The zombie lets out another rattling groan, almost in Kelly's face though the shield stands between them. "Kelly, you alright?" Jax is very much not actually moving, now, fingers resting down fiercely hot against the cold stone; his voice is low but very /determinedly/ calm. "Honey-honey, can you move. Back towards me a li'l more. Maybe. Keep an eye out behind me." As the broken-legged zombie crawls its slow way towards them. Kelly's “Ah!” sparks an answering “Eep!” from faery-Lia, her nerves all on edge and startling at the loud sound. “Zombie! No playing with zombies, they're not nice!” she reminds the boy. She shifts and turns as Jax does, follwing his lead in her best attempt at not tripping him up while he moves but /not letting go/, either. “Oh, Mr. Fairyjax, you have so many /kinds/ of magics. Thank you.” She's half-babbling in relief when the zombie fails to catch Kelly. "Ok, ok ok..." Kelly says through a series of quick breaths and makes his way backwards and to the side, way more than a little relieved that the zombie had nothing left to play with at the moment! He makes sure to clear a path for Jax, remembering all his safety lessons about being 'down range' of soldiers with big automatic guns. His head looks beyond Jax as he does, regaining his composure a bit quickly from his first panic. His bark has spread out from his neck, now, covering his throat completely. Similar spreads of the protective shell, dark brown and flakey, has spread out on his legs, back, chest, arms... and as he paces towards Jackson and Lia, he actually grows in height several inches as his skin turns slightly green. Though... it isn't able to do much beyond that, the boy's sweating face hinting that earlier vine shenanigans and two baskets full of veggies (most of which pie related) have taken most of what the boy had to give already. "Theres one crawling behind ya, but it's... doin' it at a slow mosey." This time Jackson does not answer. He waits for Kelly to move back away before the shield drops; the zombie overbalances, lunging forward past it and half-stumbling towards them. And then dropping quickly, with another neat bolt through the skull. Jackson seems to relax heavily with the shield gone; at least he is /breathing/ again, his shoulders dropping out of their tense-held state. "Y'all all okay, still?" He's still frowning, deeply, as he turns now to take care of the third in one last flash of sizzling-hot light. Then quiet. He stops, waiting. Listening to the trees. There's a rustle, though this time not footsteps but iridescent blue wings thrumming rapidly in a descent from the stable roof. Sugar lands, with the zombies dispatched, turning huge multifaceted blue eyes on the others as she cautiously approaches Jax. "-- Oh. Oh, honey, you're alright too." He's clearly also relieved at this. His hand still rests on Lia, though his other reaches out towards the dragonfly. "-- Kelly, Lia, this is Sugar, she's livin' in the stables till things is safe again, I was comin' out to check on her an' the horses. Um. But I don't know if -- we should." He glances back towards the stable door with a deep frown. "I need to get help an' clean that up 'fore it attracts any others." Lia watches wide-eyed at everything, still except for following where Jax moves. The shield dropping. The zombie falling. The other animated corpse crawling in the stable. The...giant dragonfly. “Ohgosh, look at her /wings/.” She reaches a hand out for the dragonfly, as well, since Jax doesn't seem to be getting /his/ bitten off. The mention of fetching help finally perks her attention back up and away from the pretty. “Who should help? I am at the very big house already. I can get them. So-very-fast. Like a thought.” Kelly-Extra-Large-and-Green sighs with relief as the unfortunate dead people are made even deader and he rubs his hand across his brow. But the appearance of the dragon fly he had no idea was coming makes him jump again until introductions are made. "Oh, n-nice to meet you, Sugar." He says at last. And even with slightly green skin, Kelly shows he can still blush a bit. "Yeah, I'm fine. Though... apologies for uhm, freaking out a little bit on ya, sir." The mention of Lia being able to jump away pulls his eyes down to the stone girl, and then he looks back up to Jax. "I..." with a sad suck of breath offer something he obviously doesn't want to do, nor is he obviously in much shape to actually deliver on, not that he would admit.. "Can help you clean up if that's what you need... But I'm glad your friend is safe at least." Sugar is more than happy to receive pettings, rubbing her round head up into the offered hands as her wings fold back against her body. "Beautiful, ain't she? Kinda followed me home one day, been takin' care'a her since." His teeth drag against his lip and he decides, "Can you tell Professor Summers and Dr. Grey? 'bout the zombies at the stable and the dead --" Here a rather troubled look crosses his face, his gaze slipping inwards towards the two broken stall doors. "-- the horses." He offers Kelly a quick smile, but wan and tired. His arm curls around his chest, fingers curling into the crook of the opposite elbow. "It's a freak-out-worthy kinda situation. Be honest with you, I'm plenty freaked out myself. Y'don't never really get used to --" He looks back towards the dead zombies, and shrugs. "M'so -- mmph. Let's -- can we just. Go back inside for now, I don't know if stayin' out here just at the moment is --" He gives another unhappy look into the stables. "Might be best t'come explore the stables later when s'light an' cleaned up. For now we can jus' go in an' -- not. Be around zombies." Faery-Lia is lost for another second in sheer /glee/ at the dragonfly nuzzling her hand. She makes a happy little gurgle-purr noise in the back of her throat, half muttering some kind of nonsense through it. Oh, but then there are /instructions/. Things to do! "Professor Summers. Doctor Grey. Zombies an'...poor horses." The rounded stone lips turn downward, saddened at the reminder, though it looks more like a /pout/ given the way the face is carved. "We should play later. With Sugar and the horses. Once they have had time not to be so sad about their friends anymore." Her hand reaches back from the dragonfly to wrap around a few of Jax's fingers. "Thank you for not letting the zombies eat Kellygreen. Or the other horses." Then she steps away, out of habit putting the statue back the way she had found it: seated, legs crossed over one another, hands holding a lack of book and head bowed down as if to read it. The stone goes still. "Right. But be careful, Lia." Kelly agrees on both counts. "Thanks, sir... and I am so- erm... sad for." He simply nods towards the stable. The question of what to do with the statue crosses his mind but as he slowly begins to shrink back down to normal size and a dangerously white skin tone... he can't exactly lift it! "But... not zombies. That sounds nice. I think there may even be some of your pie left... but... I guess even I'm not hungry right now." "We can play. Sugar's got a saddle of her own. Ridin' her y'can /fly/. She takes some time t'get used t'new people 'fore she's okay with that, though." Jackson squeezes back at Lia's fingers, and rubs at Sugar's head a moment longer, then pats the dragonfly lightly. He watches the statue revert to inanimate stone with a note of wonder in his eye. "... right." He opens the door to the stable a little wider in case Sugar wants to go back in, but then offers a hand to Kelly. "Y'need help, hon? Y'look a little peaky. An' maybe we can wrap up a piece'a pie an' save it for later on. Once y'got an appetite again."