I12DT - Getting under her skin

[Victoria Valentine]

"We don't know without trying. Carefully." And careful she was as she touched the magic blade to the seam, drawing it very carefully down, not wanting to press harder than she had to. There was always the chance that she was wrong about the 'mask' bit, after all.

[The Book of Sins]

As the blade sinks in it draws blood. Or at least so it seems at first glance. Once it seeps out from under the skin it turns oily black in colour, almost seeming to spread up along the dagger some from surface tension.

[Samantha McManus]

"...that was everywhere when she escaped. Especially in that guard."

[Melpomene]

"Hey! What are you doing? Get that knife away from my face!"

[Victoria Valentine]

Victoria swore, not daring to touch it. Instead she tried studying it with her mystical senses through the athame. "Curiouser and curiouser," she said, not listening to the whining of the possible-person.

[The Book of Sins]

It seems to be some sort of manifestation from the spaces inbetween. It's not really an entity itself but more feelings and impressions given physical shape. The hand reaching out from under the staircase, the shadow under your bed, the darkness just beyond a streetlight.

[Samantha McManus]

"It feels... just wrong."

[Victoria Valentine]

"...I thought you said she was just a psychic," Victoria said, shuddering slightly. "This... is a lot deeper than that. Deeper than I like."

[Samantha McManus]

"If she was just a psychic, I wouldn't have brought you in. The woman I faced was, but I don't know what this is..."

[Melpomene]

"Someone with a knife dangling over her face. I know we've had our rough spots but I really wouldn't have expected this from you, Sammy."

[Victoria Valentine]

"Well, we know what it isn't," Victoria said. "Her."

"The problem with thing that are particularly dark is that they tend to not let their secrets out to someone who isn't about to throw in with them."

[Samantha McManus]

"Her mind has been tampered with in a rather more mundane fashion. In spite of this, I can't help but think that this mask was something that was done to her as well, that there's a person under there."

[The Book of Sins]

While Sam and Victoria are standing around the movement under the skin increases until it suddenly lifts itself up, supported by a growing stream of the oily black substance that seems to be flowing out of the 'back' of the mask. It slides off of Mel's face, leaving behind a literally empty face. No eyes, no mouth, no nothing. Just blank skin.

[Victoria Valentine]

Victoria held out her hand as she watched, a faint shimmering barrier curving in front of her. "Well then. That's at least distasteful," she said, but she wasn't looking at the blank face that was revealed. She was more focused on finding out where the black ooze was going.

[Prosopon]

That was probably a wise decision because the slime keeps oozing out of the back of the mask, rapidly growing in mass, taking a worm-like shape before growing dozens of twitching legs. The mask still sticks to it, looking at Sam and Victoria with Melpomene's face. Then the creature shivers and it almost looks as if it's turning itself inside out somehow as the creature takes on a more defined shape.

[Samantha McManus]

Samantha stumbled back, but her mind was already springing to defense, the flock rising up from her, their eyes fixed on the threat.

[Victoria Valentine]

"Darling, the next time you pick an arch-nemesis, pick one that's sexier, hm?"

"It does make this part more interesting."

Victoria and her avatar split apart, taking opposite sides of the... thing.

[Prosopon]

"Are you donating one of your pretty faces?" the creature hisses, eyeing Vickie's avatar.

[Samantha McManus]

"This isn't her, but I've a feeling it can lead us to her..."

[Victoria Valentine]

"Fac- wait a second..." Victoria frowned, as this rang a bell. "Who are you," she demanded.

[Prosopon]

"Which would you prefer. Tezculipocan the Gorged, Thamuz, Prosopon the Many, she and hers would know me as Dreach'itear." it says, turning to Sam.

[Samantha McManus]

"You won't be known as anything if you don't lead me to your mistress..."

[Prosopon]

"So feisty. But I don't think she would appreciate that. I'm just here to claim what's mine. Unless you want too make a trade..." it grins, curling it's body up and looking around the room at the two Victoria's, Sam's ravens and, apparently, the rest of Sam's menagerie. "So many to choose from."

[Victoria Valentine]

"I'm going to recall to you the reports from a little incident last week in the common room, darling," Victoria said to Sam. "When a few of our little ne'er-do-wells seemed to be dragged out of this plane."

"We've been wondering when we'd get to meet this one..."

[Prosopon]

"Oh I'd never encroach on the Morrigan's realm." it says, and while that's clearly a lie in general it seems to be the truth in this particular case. "But I make no promises when they come to me."

[Samantha McManus]

"Then I'm not seeing much incentive to suffer this one," she said to Victoria.

[Prosopon]

And that's when the creature springs into motion, the coiled body launching it towards Sam much faster than anything this size has any right to be.

[Samantha McManus]

Poised as her mind was, the flock buffeted the thing mercilessly as it attacked, her body splitting apart and vacating her clothes as the physical aligned with the mental.

[Prosopon]

Either the creature expected that or was lunging at the birds in the first place. Either way, it grabs some of them in it's hands as it twists it's body around and crashes into the opposing wall.

"Bite-sized." it laughs and opens it's mouth to start munching on it's feathery prey. Inside is nothing but seemingly endless space.

[Samantha McManus]

Enough of her managed to reform to be standing at another angle from the creature, her arm elongating into a bone spear that she thrust at the thing's abdomen.

[Prosopon]

The creature is hard to miss. It's skin is tough but the spear pierces it and sinks into Prosopon's flesh, rewarding Sam with a gloob of blood that seems a little too viscous to be called normal.. It lets out a wailing screech and hefts it's lower part around to slam into Sam and dislodge the spear, it's pointy legs flailing blindly.

[Samantha McManus]

Muscle grows and bunches up in her arm behind the spear as she tries to embed the tip in the wall behind the creature, just before she's knocked back by its bulk.

However, the spear separates from her arm as she's knocked back, and Prosopon would find quite disturbingly that it was starting to grow barbs within the wound, spreading out inside.

[Victoria Valentine]

Victoria's avatar began weaving a binding to snare the centipede while Victoria herself launched herself forward, arrows of energy forming in the air around them to streak at the enemy.

[Prosopon]

The creature lets go of the raven's when Vickie pelts it with energy bolts, raising a couple of it's arms to protect itself while another one grips the spear Sam left behind and slowly pulls it out the wound, apparently disregarding how much of itself it tears out along with it, leaving behind an oozing wound. Lifting the bone up to it's maw it bites down on it hard, breaking it in half with a loud crunch and swallowing a significant chunk of it.

[Samantha McManus]

Samantha winced in pain, still connected to the spear she had been controlling. More barbs shot out of the chunk in its mouth, but her connection to it was fading as the construct it represented was broken.

[Prosopon]

She'd find that it does react, but the barbs hit nothing. It's like the piece is floating in a void, slowly being pulled away from her into a vast nothingness.

[Victoria Valentine]

Victoria's avatar continued trying to hamper the creature, not sure what would happen if she let up, even if the spell wasn't as effective as she'd like.

Creatures of spirit all obey the same rules, she could hear her latest tutor saying. Be they spirits of light or void, weak or strong. The only difference is the power of the spirit that confronts them, and their determination. Their resolve.

Her feet twisted on the ground into a braced stance, dagger held along her wrist as she made the gestures of the spell.
"Flash of shadow! Warmth of ice! Dark becomes light, death becomes life! By the powers that guide and protect, be bound by will!" she shouted, feeling her determination harden into an iron edge. The spell rippled out from her like coils of light that sought to bind the creature, physically and spiritually, to her will.

[The Book of Sins]

As the spell begins to wrap around the creature Victoria would notice that it was already bound. She could try to fight for dominance but it's a very entangled bind that'd be hard to break. Mainly because it's not bound to a person directly but something bigger, the ties solidifying into densely woven black magic, so entangled they would take physical shape by themselves. A single page that in itself is part of something larger still. And through that page someone is exerting control over the spirit.

[Samantha McManus]

Samantha meanwhile had recovered from the painful feedback, and lashed out brutally at the creature with her mind.

[Prosopon]

The creature reels back and Sam would feel the piece of her that it bit off slow down in it's descend into the void. And with her mind lashing out she'd get the feeling that there was some kind of presence in the void that was tugging on the part of her it had a hold on. It pulsed, almost like a slow heartbeat from beyond.