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Metody has reached a breaking point.

This delusion is not fading. If anything, it is becoming stronger and more elaborate. There are more people now, not just the disturbingly hordes of empty people that Metody can write off as the repetition of a hallucinating mind, but real people. They have histories and motivations and they interact in strange ways, and they are so intricately real that he cannot explain them as echoes in his mind.

And there is detail. Every rock, every tree, every dried autumn leaf he can find - they're all different. Even things that are manufactured to be similar, like bricks, even those have tiny variations. A flick of lighter brick here, a different pattern of sooty inclusions, a little scrawl of dirt there - all different. And it all leads him to conclusions that make him feel overwhelmed and reckless, and massively self destructive. In another person, this might translate to wandering through traffic or climbing on ledges, but Metody has a more indirect form of risky behavior:

Somewhere in the city, there is a quiet flurry of clicks. Something scrapes at the mouth of a storm drain, and then a waving spine extends to quiver on the air. A moment later, the creature pours out after, tapping along on a multitude of skittering rib-legs, bold and open in the sunlight.

There are other creatures, elsewhere. In the library, a delicate mouse-thing darts along the tops of the shelves, peeking down at people with a multitude of eyes it doesn't have. In the forest, octopus-like things made of ringed pelvises and far too many spines writhe over rocks and trees. And in the sewers, the heavy dog-like skulls splash down the tunnels, lurching on their too-many legs. All of them spread out, dragging or darting, ranging through Taxon in a dizzied search for the repeated patterns or hidden symbols that would prove it's all just a crazy dream.

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That storm drain's pretty close to Emma's new, reluctantly-claimed digs and that noise really gets her attention. One look out the window and her brain tries to lurch away, rejecting what she sees as some nightmare abomination.

"Oh. My. God." Well, she can barricade herself in and hope that thing doesn't climb-- it just climbed out of the sewer, it can totally make it to the second floor. She attaches her tablet to her bracelet, takes up her sword and her gun, and bolts for the door, practically leaping down the stairs.

Once outside she freezes again, not sure what to do until the idea to call for backup comes to mind because hell no does she want to take this thing on alone. She hits her tablet to broadcast voice.

"Uh, people? There's a monster, bone-monster thing out here, I can use some help!"

Then, part warning and part signal, she fires her gun into the air.

By the time she's out, Metody is at the juncture of two buildings, investigating the brickwork. He freezes at the sound of the gunshot, cowering. The only way out is past her - oh, no, no, no - or up the wall. Which would probably make her think he was attacking.

Oh, crap. This was a bad idea.

A second later, his human voice sounds from the tablet, tight from barely controlled stress. "Sorry, did you say bone monster? Can I see?"

Edited 2013-02-13 15:15 (UTC)

Is it...what is it doing? Not coming after her, no, but it could be making monster things or plotting an attack and she levels the gun in its direction.

Then there's a voice and Emma jumps, startled.

"See it?" she repeats, peering at the tablet on her wrist and switching to video. There's a brief glimpse of her baffled expression before she turns it to show the cornered creature. "There you go, now what the hell do I do?"

Mostly, it is quivering with terror, and trying to compress itself into as small a space as possible.

Relief floods him as she turns the tablet around. Oh. Oh, thank goodness. She's not just going to blast him to pieces.

"Oh! - oh, that's - I met one of those in the forest. I don't think it's dangerous."

" - we played fetch for a bit."

"Fetch?" That's the sound of incredulity right there. "What did you do, throw it a bone?"

Oh God that is in the poorest of taste, also absurd, but the thing still isn't making a move so she feel confident in taking a step closer.

"If I throw something, will it chase it?"

"No, a stick. And a rock, but it had the worst time picking it up, so I put that down after a few rounds."

Cower. Cower, cower, cringe. And now it is trembling.

"Probably? Mine was pretty eager to play and kind of desperate to please. Kind of like a dog that someone had been kicking."

Awww, poor...terrifying monster thing.

"Probably need a pretty big boot to kick this thing," Emma mutters, but she's game. Looking around she spots a suspciously convenient pile of construction scraps from the palce being renovated across the street, among them a couple broom handles. She makes her way over, still not turning her back on the creature, and grabs one pole. "All right, here goes--"

She whistles sharply and waves the stick. "Here boy!, this better nto get me killed!"

It flinches a little when she moves, and so does Metody. At the whistle, the creature lifts...it doesn't have a head, as such. But the frontal portion lifts, tilting a little, and then she waves the stick and oh my gosh a stick. The creature sits up, fear gone, and does an excited little dance as Metody puss his all into selling it.

The boney portion does, that is. His human portion just smiles. "See? Kind of cute. Ish."

"You've got a weird definition of cute," she remarks, and wonder again what her life has come to. "Here goes."

Emma twists and throws the stick up the street behind her, immediately retreating behind a lamp post as it clatters away. If that thing actually goes after it she's giving it a wide berth.

"I doubt it chose to be ugly." You jerk.

The creature explodes into motion, gleefully chasing after the broomstick. It isn't able to pluck it out of the sure, but it does run it down and pounce on it. The creature whirls and takes a few steps towards Emma -

- who just darned near tried to kill it. It gently lays the stick dow, and then creeps towards the sewer, trying to look small and harmless.

She's got opinions, man. And okay the tragic harmless routine's starting to win her over. Emma's expression softens a little and she eases back around the lamp post, keeping her empty hands where it can see(?) them.

"It's a long way from the forest," she remarks and takes a cautious step closer. "Must've really gotten itself lost."

Step. Step. Maybe heading for the stick. Maaaaybe gonna throw again.

"If it really is a Lost Dog, it'd find the forest pretty lonely. They want to be around people."

Gasp! Is she really?! It pauses, practically quivering with hope.

"Uh huh." Skepticism, but...she's had to accept so much, and so what if this hand't been in Mayland's letter? So what if it's weird looking? If it really is an alien planet or whatever, why shouldn't there be other alien things?

She does indeed crouch and pick up the broomstick, waving it once more as she rises. Sure, let's do this she thinks and then pitches the stick overhand back down the street again.

"So you're the Lost Dog Whisperer?"

Oh, OH, SHE DID. The creature takes off after it, and Metody straightens, voice brightening.

"Oh, golly, no!" In the street, the creature leaps and this time, it plucks the broom stick from the air. "But we have them back home? They're sad, and very friendly, and follow most basic directions, provided it isn't something like, 'go sit in front of a steam roller.' They're kind of protective, too."

"I mean, they are dogs, after all. Mostly."

It is surreal, running and playing and seeing himself running and playing. He's never really watched himself through the clarifying distance of a screen.

Man. He really is creepy, isn't he.

Yes. Yes, Metody, creepy you are.

"Not like any dog I've ever seen." But then people here were from all over everywhere so that doesn't mean much. Still, if it follows commands:

"Hey!" Emma calls to the...Lost Dog? Sure. "You gonna bring that back?"

"It's....it used to be a dog? Sort of? You don't have them where you're from, do you."

That is not actually a question. Well. The lack of knowledge makes this simultaneously easier to spin and harder to sell.

"They're dogs who lost their masters, either through abandonment or something bad happened. The most important thing in the world is gone, but they're too loyal to just lay down and die, so they just...keep going. And in time, they fade away to just bones, and then they tend to join up with each other. That's why they look so strange."

"It happens to cats and horses, too. Or any domestic animal."

Does....does he have to? She's scary. But he slinks back, low to the ground, and offers up the stick again.

"That's..." Weird? Sad? Weirdly sad? "Different. No, there's nothing at all like this where I'm fro-- where I grew up."

Because who the hell knows what manner of beasts lurk in Fairy Tale Land (she needs to come up with a better name for it).

Hey, she's trying to be less scary here, she just needs to steel herself for it. As the Lost Dog approaches she stays still, then reaches for the stick with one hand and goes to pat it on the...okay she's not sure what it's analogous to but it looks like ribs curving away from a spine. Nice doggie?

"Sorry I...scared. You."

"Yeah, it sort of seems like my home is....a touch different. Um. From everyone else's"

Metody's voice tightens a little when she reaches towards the 'dog' part of himself. He coughs a few times, turning his flesh part away from the camera while the dog part shows the party. After a moment, it lifts it's fore portion to gently bump against her hand.

"They're all ultimately the same creature, kind of like a beehive, but people usually name the individuals to save confusion."

Or, Metody did, to make things more organized in his head. Humans just had a left hand and a right hand, but he had fifteen or so of them, and they didn't just stay on the right or left, and sometimes they merged. It was so much easier to think of Barry and Daisybelle and Sunshine than this one and that one and the other.

Help? Bone monster? He can't think of one single instance where 'bone' and 'monster' could or would be a good thing, and his all too vivid imagination paints some really friggin' terrifying pictures. He grabs his tablet, goes to |voice|.

"Cain here, on my way!"

Oh thank God, someone she assumed to be competent.

"Make it quick, it's got itself cornered." Which is never, ever a good place for a monster to be.

Long is reading, and sipping tea (activities he is engaged in a good 30% of the time), in the peace and quiet of his library. When his keen ears first detect the light skittering, he at first assumes it is perhaps a rodent.

Taxon's library has never before had rodents for him to contend with. If this is their latest nod to realism, he is going to be quite annoyed. One does not need to duplicate an experience exactly. And he does not want mice chewing upon 'his' books.

He scans the nearest shelves with narrowed, unhappy eyes that give him a stronger resemblance to something predatory and reptilian than usual.

"I shall get traps," he says with dire warning, hunting for mice.

When he sees the bone creature instead of a small furry animal, Long is... taken aback. He sits back in his chair with a huff, expression shifting to something more confused, albeit not alarmed.

"...on the other hand, I am now unsure as to how they ought be baited," he murmurs, head tilted to eye the strange little bone-thing.

Maybe with extremely old cheese? The little mouse-like thing continues along the shelf, then perks up, sensing Long. It turns and dances down the sheer cliff of the front of the vertical supports, pausing at roughly face height to study him.

Long's brows cliiiiiimb up to somewhere near his hairline, but he doesn't pull away, just eyes the little inquisitive thing.

After thinking it over, he raises one hand, knuckles out, as if expecting a cat to sniff at it.

"....hello."

The dome of its skull lifts up, branching into a feathery multitude of hinged jaws. They twitch over his hand, light as air, then fold down again. It considers whatever it learned from the brief investigation, then attempts to climb onto the proffered hand.

Long clears his throat. It's a slightly uncertain sound. Wary, but not fearful. Still, he doesn't move his hand; he holds still at the dry clattery insectoid bone legs clamber onto his own somewhat-bony hand. The white of ossified matter is very pale against Long's dark skin.

He draws his hand closer to better inspect the clicking little bone horror, brows knit together. His other hand hunts in the desk for his tablet.

It settles on his hand, allowing for mutual observation.

It only looks like a mouse at first glance. The head has far too many eye sockets, ringed all the way around the false brain case. It has a relatively normal spine and rib cage, but the ribs are curved to accommodate three sets of legs. What look like feet are actually miniscule skulls that grip the surface beneath them with open jaws, and there is either a tassel at the end of the creature's tail, or a tiny hand.

It settles down on the back four legs then lifts one of the front to energetically wave at Long. Long! Hi, Long! You're so great, actually letting Metody touch you! Hooray!

"Curioser and curioser, as Alice might have said," Mayland says with a little thoughtful hum.

He lifts his tablet with his free hand and uses it to take a few still photographs of the critter, and then he-- somewhat awkwardly, with the use of only one hand, as he is keeping the other still-- opens up a broadcast to the city.

"Excuse me," says Long's voice, background to the visual of his strange hand surmounted by the stranger bone 'mouse' atop it, "but does anyone know what this is?"

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lalala all the backtags /weeps gently

Oh brain, why won't you cooperate?

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