ArchivedLogs:Ex-Students

Ex-Students
Dramatis Personae Isra, Kelly
In Absentia	2013-11-08 chomp. (Part of Infected TP.)
Location <XS> Forest
Quiet and shady, the trees rise all around here high and thick. In stillness, woodland creatures make appearances, though sudden noises scare them back into the cover. Dappled sunlight filters down between the thick foliage, and the ground underfoot is heavily overgrown, though here and there paths have been worn, by deer or years of students wandering familiar trails. Despite zombies, tenticle boys, demon librarians, and laser eyes... Kelly still feels more than a little embarrassed by some of his... unique traits since starting here. And so the flustered floral friend has made his roamings of the school grounds wider and wider. Walking just enough inside the forest to break line of site to the school, the chubby child has bent down to remove the issued slippers to let his bare bark decorated feet touch the grass... and then small roots begin to wind out the tops of his feet near those bark patches and wind into the grass and dirt. He lets out a content sigh of relief, his hands falling limply to his side (One of which has DO NOT SAY written in smeared sharpy, a small list of words scribbled underneath nearly illegible) and just soaks in the fresh air half oblivious to the world as budded flowers in his hair spread out colorfully. Stalking through the forest, digitigrade legs and elongated feet carrying her over the leafy detritus in near silence. Her skin a light, unhealthy shade of gray and she wears a long black wrap dress, the hem of which looks recently wet. A large purple shawl covers her batlike wings, folded loosely across her shoulders. As she nears the edge she slows, nostrils flaring and pointed ears swivelling. When she spots Kelly, she goes still for a moment, but finally does approach, her footfalls growing louder so as to announce her presence. "Good day." She has circled around to where she can see his face, and tilts her head. "I do not believe we have met. Are you a new student, or a visitor trapped by the quarantine?" Somewhere just a short distance away, there are more footsteps in the woods, trudging crunchily against the autumn fall of dead leaves. The owners of these footsteps are currently obscured through the trees and bushes, but a closer inspection will reveal a pair of students -- one boy still in pajamas, one taller girl with a light coating of black fur and sharp-clawed hands dressed in jeans and boots and a denim jacket -- following an erratic path through the trees. Walking closer to the sound of voices. Kelly jerks at the sound of the footsteps and voice. "Jeez!" he exclaims, head ducking for cover, arms coming up protectively, and body swaying like a top hinting that this spin was just about finished, especially since his rooted feet do not immediately move. Quite the contrary, the narrow stance and rooted down toes almost trips him then and there. "Oh Sor-" he begins to say, and then stops it DEAD right there, clasping his mouth shut, and covering it with his hand. "I mean... uh... hi! And, do I count as a student if I haven't even had one class yet since coming here?" he says, embarrassed laughter trying to mask awkward speech. "Considering we have not /had/ any classes lately?" Isra smiles, the tips of her long canines showing. "I think it counts. I am Isra al-Jazari, I teach--" Her ears switch and she cants her head slightly to one side like a quizzical dog. "Is it difficult to uproot yourself from the ground at the moment?" She has turned to face the direction of the new arrivals and sniffs at the air warily. "Good day, students." The students answer. Perhaps not in the most desirable of manners; the boy, Benji, a semi-recent arrival from the springtime crop of Prometheus refugees, lets out a soft rattling croak in his throat. Frost begins to spread out from him, ice coating the ground and creeping its way up over Kelly's roots and Isra's clawed feet. The other student, Lin, says nothing at all; just drops down to all fours to /charge/ -- a good deal faster than most of the dead have been managing, but her lifetime augmented musculature is serving her well in death. Her lips pull back, sharp lupine teeth gnashing as she barrels straight for Kelly. The scream that comes out of Kelly's lips, on a manli-ness scale of 1 to 10... manages a -3 and a half. It is not his proudest moment! He also manages to answer the less obscure question of if a tree falls in the forest, and there are plenty of people around to hear it (though some quite dead if that helps his case, which it may not) it does make quite a sound. Mostly a shuffled 'OMPH!' as he tries to pull away, but twice entwined roots and ice keep narrow feet in place and 230 lbs of mutant falls right on his hind side. His only redeeming action he can't even take much credity for: his panic automatically causes the bark patches across his body to quickly expand into a hard shell of armor along his neck, chest, back, legs, and arms as twisting vines begin to thrash on his arm and ruin YET. ANOTHER. SHIRT. Isra growls, a low, loud bass rumble, and drops into a crouch. When the flexing of her inhuman feet break the ice around them, she springs into the path of Lin's charge. She grapples at the student--or ex-student--with long, taloned fingers, wings mantling to bring even more sharp claws to the ready. "Run!" The instruction can only be meant for Kelly, but it comes out in a bestial roar that might not even be recognizable as English. Lin's teeth gnash again, sharp-toothed jaws lunging for the thinner membrane of Isra's wings, champing down in repetitive CHOMP. The talons to hit home, ripping through kind of dirty-damp jacket to the flesh beneath, though if this /hurts/ her she gives no sign. Only more biting. Benji is slower, behind her, a layer of frost over his skin even colder than most of the dead. But he progresses inexorably forward towards the downed tree-boy, dropping to a crouch to -- well, try and bite. For all the effectiveness human teeth have against a thick crust of bark. Gnaw? Gnaw, gnaw, gnaw? The bark isn't invincible and will give way to scrapes and chomps, baring lighter wood underneath. And since it is every bit as much of Kelly's skin as the pink squishy type, he yells out painfully as eyes quickly water and his face clenches tight. Did he understand the roar / run instruction? Perhaps or perhaps not, but the gist of getting the heck away is certainly the tip of his mind and he tugs and pulls on legs locked hard in place. "I'm stuck!" he informs in case it can help as he tries to lash the vines on one of his arms around the frosty zombie, two inch long razor sharp barbs trying to dig into skin and possessing incredible strength. And all the while Kelly seems to be... getting fatter? Isra's mouth opens wide, and what comes out is a thunderous /roar/ most people only encounter in fantasy film special effects. Her wings snap inward, slamming into Lin's jaw in a bid to shake its grip loose. Meanwhile, she lifts the student bodily and hurls her aside before turning her attention to the plant under assault by frost. She tears Benji away from Kelly. "Can you afford to lose them?" This time her words are slightly more comprehensible. "The roots?" Lin's teeth don't /unclamp/; though she's hurled aside readily with Isra's generous strength she might well be taking a bit of flesh /with/ her. Another rattle comes out of her mouth when she lands with a WHUMPH in the leaves and though this slows her by way of necessitating getting back /up/, she does not seem to suffer the disorientation or pain this would incur in others. She rolls back to her feet, her gait a little lopsided now -- one of her arms has grown an extra /joint/ where it shouldn't have one, broken sharply and not, therefore, supporting her weight in her forward lope as well as it used to. But still she charges, not bothering to straighten this time but just /pouncing/ at Isra's side from her feral crouched position. Benji's chomping teeth chomp with more /earnest/ as Kelly lashes, but his movement is restricted now by the vines. His arms struggle against them, encumbered more by the binding than by the thorns; he doesn't seem to notice how they tear at his skin. More ice is spreading out of him, freezing the vines around him and creeping frosty fingers out towards Kelly's stomach and chest where Benji persistently attempts to GNAW. Kelly 's feet nearly double in size as green bulging streaks begin to show in his skin and those bark patches grow, and though it may break through the ice, those roots are indeed still the problem. "Yeah, I can loose them." he confirms, though the continued munching and biting has him too distracted to stop creeping zombie fingers and unfortunately un-armored stomachs. Then he sees the fuzzy girl jumping towards Lin and yells out: "LOOK OUT!" as if that were a magic word. By this point the boy is half again as tall as he used to be, and similarly as thick, but has no longer any control over the frozen vines on his right hand. Turning nimbly for someone with such ungainly long limbs, Isra meets Lin's pounce and redirecting the teen to the ground with more brute force than finesse. SLAM. Keeping one hand on her neck, claws digging in, Isra snarls and slashes at her opponent with the other hand, not particularly careful now about what she cuts through. Lin stumbles backwards, talons raking through her jacket to leave her chest flayed open, a large flap of flesh hanging down. And still she struggles, her own strength formidable as well though starting out already pinned makes her gnashing harder. Her clawed hands do rake upwards, lashing out for Isra's face, arms. Benji's teeth clamp down against Kelly's side, tearing into the lighter wood beneath in a savage CHOMP of -- woodsy flesh. One bite, too, and then he just stumbles back, the frozen vines cracking and breaking around him. He spits out the woody chunks he's gouged, apparently losing /interest/ after getting this unmeaty mouthful. Now sufficiently strong enough to pull himself free of his own roots, Kelly rips his feet free from the ice, with... unfortunate consequences, though it really pales in comparison to the wound on his side. It may taste like tree, but it was /his/ tree, and is bleeding thick and green in spurts on the ground. The vines on his right arm in a similar state, thrashing around like decapitated snakes, only short little stubs. He stumbles to the nearest tree, slamming his hand against it... and... /in/ it. "Lets go!" he begs Isra, hoping desperately that she is still healthy enough to, as he wills the big thick tree branches to come down and attempt to pin the two zombie kids in place to cover their exit. Loosing a lot of blood, he is danger of passing out as it is. Snarling, Isra bites down on the hand flailing at her face. She digs the claws of one hand into Lin's shoulder, flips the teen into a prone position, and rest one knee--along with most of her weight--onto her back. The other hand seizes her Lin's head and jerks it back sharply in a bid to break spine. Without really waiting to see just how immobilized this leaves her opponent, Isra rises and, bloodied, staggering over to Kelly. She takes one look at him and somehow, though her expression has not changed, looks quite alarmed. "I will carry you." Without further exposition, she scoops him up in gory hands and puts him over her shoulder--one wing wrapped around to stabilize the load--and lopes back toward the school. Behind them, there is only the raspy continuing rattle of the once-students, a creak of ice and rustle of leaves as they continue to thrash against the ground beneath their binding branches.