happening - open; fragile mentality

[rhosmari]

''You know I'm here, always here, watching you.''
''She doesn't know that. She knows she isn't real...''

''She feels it in her head, in her skin. Burning her flesh up. I should rephrase it. She feels us. We are the same.''
''She does not. She does not. SHE DOES NOT! SHE DOES NOT KNOW HER!''

Her voice rang out clearly through the tangled woods that she had been used to calling her home now. Vibrating from her throat in a horrible screech as her eyes focused on the apparition before her. That whispering voice that lurked in the back of her mind, taunting her and telling her things she didn't know if she could refuse or not. Making her uncertain of her decisions and of others around her. The hazy mirage that looked like her and yet she knew that it wasn't her and she just wanted whatever it was to be gone. It stalked toward her and she recoiled as if she was about to be struck. A laugh emitting from her throat or was it her own? She was confused and shook her head before she turned her eyes away from the woman trying to think through this situation. It had happened before and she had managed to break free of it and she had told no one. ''Trying so hard to not accept her fate. He opened the door, we have come to claim our rightful place.'' The mirage was close not, warm and near her face. Fire licking at her maw and she pressed hard against the tree. A tree that was slowly smoldering and burning as her own heated body started to catch it on fire.

[butch kennedy]

[glow=blue,1,400]YES, SOME THINGS NEVER CHANGE, LIKE THE FEEL OF YOUR HAND IN MINE — ｡+ﾟ.[/glow]

Since her birth, Firefly had been told that sometimes the depths of the swamps and marshes of her home smelled of smoke and sulfur.  She had always been told to ignore it, for if you gave the will-o-wisps any mind then you would be whisked away by marsh-fairies that stole your tail.  Now that she was older, Firefly realized that the marsh-fairies and will-o-wisps were ghost stories used to scare the cubs of her homeland into staying close to their parents and the sulfur smell was the result of aging peat moss.

However, this ashy scent was accompanied by the sickly sound of wood crackling and splintering under heat and pressure.

Firefly couldn't run, but that didn't stop her from half-slithering as quickly as she could towards the threat of fire.  She could smell another creature, some sort of feline, among the burning.  She had to help if she could, since she was around, legs be damned!

Firefly didn't notice that the fire was coming from the cheetah.  It didn't even occur to her.  The only information that registered in her mind was that this animal was going to get hurt if they didn't move.  Moving on pure instinct, Firefly lurched forward in a desperate attempt to slam her body into the cheetah to knock her away from the burning tree.

template credit to guppy

[rhosmari]

The woman was scared. She was terrified. To claim what? To claim her? She had always been her so what was this? The fear was almost nauseating with how strong it was but she had little time to react as suddenly there was a new scent. One that was from the outside, that brought comfort to the tribal woman. Anything but this. The king cheetah felt her body be pushed away from the tree just as it burst into flames, the blue and white fire licking and curling around the tree like a serpent. Hungry it ate at the bark, popping and hissing and she tried not to look at it and instead at the one that had pushed her away. Yet her words were glued to her tongue, trying to swallow down what she had seen happen she looked down at her paws. They were shaking, she was shaking. "Thank you... This one is sorry." Though she was sure that she didn't even know she was the cause of this. The tribal woman didn't want to talk about it but she was sure it would come up. Facing this new reality was harder than she ever wanted anything to be. What was she? Who had she been?

[wormwood.]

[rhosmari]

The moment she saw Aurum she felt a deep sense of shame. Shame for having the inability to control herself. Putting things in danger because of her deteriorating state. Her eyes looked down at her paws and she tried not to think of the devastation of the tree that he had to correct. The earth smoldering the flames and slowly causing them to seethe and hiss as they soon perished. What was she doing? Her head hurt. She closed her eyes for a moment as she listened to his tone, what he was asking. She knew she should have went to him sooner and she had thought about it before. But she thought that perhaps whatever this was would stop. Eventually. She just needed to have the will power or at least that was what she had thought. Taking a deep breathe in she lifted her gaze up to the lion and she tried to hide the fear that was within herself. She needed that confidence back, what she used to be. She was no mewling kit running to her milk nurse. She was a warrior in her own right.

"She..." A pause as she tried to wrap her head around what was happening. Would it be bad to say? Would she have to lie? She didn't want to lie to him. There was only one option then. "He hurt her head. She is broken because of him, seeing things....hearing things." To admit that she was a broken warrior was harder than she thought. Almost useless in this state and she shook her head a bit. "Elsweyr is far from okay...she is damaged and it hurts."

[butch kennedy]

[glow=blue,1,400]YES, SOME THINGS NEVER CHANGE, LIKE THE FEEL OF YOUR HAND IN MINE — ｡+ﾟ.[/glow]

"Well, this one is glad that you're not a crisp."  Firefly was a little surprised that she hadn't earned a few singed hairs herself and she sent up a quiet prayer to whatever goddess was listening.  He, the cheetah said.  Firefly didn't know who this he was, most likely Stryker or one of his yucky-ucky minions, but if he was the reason that Elsweyr didn't feel safe with herself then he was going to pay for it!

"I'll strangle this guy with two vines and a smile."  Firefly let out a growl before allowing her face to soften for the cheetah's sake.  "But you need to sleep first.  You can't repair a mind without a restart.  My brother taught me a few remedies for dealing with both mental and physical pain in the aftermath of... well..."  The liger tilted her head back to motion to her paralyzed back legs and tail.  "So I could help you a little?"

template credit to guppy

[Grimm]

[div style="margin: auto; background-image: linear-gradient(to top left, #575f70 50%, #68949f 50%); max-width: 475px; height: auto; padding: 2%; border: 1px #1d1d1d solid;"][div style="margin: auto; background-color: #1d1d1d; max-width: 475px; color: #fefefe; padding: 5%; min-height: 20px; border: 1px #1d1d1d solid; font-family: verdana; font-size: 9pt; text-align: justify; line-height: 17px;"]The mind is a wonderful and terrible thing. Powerful that it may conjure and perform with supposed ease, restrictions only so far as it may be stretched. Yet fragile it, a glass cage with walls beckoning the thrown stone, beneath strain falling away in a cascade of shards.

To exist — live was to ache for the tranquillity of a clear mind even as the pieces cut into shaking fingers incapable of resembling the mess it had become.

The days proceeding the eviction of their captors had been exceedingly uneventful, though blatant falsehood would it be to admit displeasure with such. As best he had been capable held as closely together his own deteriorating mind, the stress caused a strain he was unaccustomed to, yet numb had he grown beneath a carefully affixed facade. Always easier to pretend, allow strained smile and false cheer to invade few words, focused upon the minimal good. Alone may he discard it, allow the terror to well and seep through the cracks, such his reasoning for traversing the twisted woodlet.

Short cut his time, however, sharp the crack, beneath ravenous tongue of heat wood popping and giving way with a groan. Expected but not apparent the fall, trajectory shifting as hasty steps grew clumsy. Scene he entered perplexing at first glance. Peered to the trunk smothered beneath risen earth, hissing as dwindling embers died. Close together a trio, familiar two and other stranger, yet manner of speech indicated she was one of them. Soothed nerves for a moment before a few tentative steps drew him closer, note made of how Elsweyr seemed lost, reduced beneath a plight her tongue tripped over as the words filled the smoke tinted air.

Words failed as teeth ground into his tongue, inadequate all that arose in stilted thoughts. About vision flicked, sought something that may assist, anything he may say or do. Upward chin moved, mouth working without sound, approach conducted with small steps. Forth leaning, upon toes weight braced, offered a smile as he strained to graze his nose against her shoulder. "We help, family always there for each other."