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Post by Bee on Apr 26, 2009 1:01:16 GMT -5
 Phaedra twirled a small round lollypop around her tongue as she walked, nose in her book, between the tall shelves in the library. It was a little more difficult to walk two-legged, but Phaedra had long since adapted--a bit of an odd gait was a small price to pay to have paws open for book-grabbing. Walking was worthless on its own. She needed to multitask. She twitched her nose to push her glasses a little higher up. This was an older edition of Craft's classic horror novel, before outside pressure had forced her to revise it and take out some of the more controversial bits dealing with class prejudice and the nature of magic. And the sex. She was actually quite enjoying herself, before she tripped over something large and soft, went entirely arse-over-teakettle, lost her book and glasses, and smacked face-first into a wall. |
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Post by Vyn on Apr 26, 2009 1:17:57 GMT -5
It was always the same, no matter what library he had managed to slip into he was always caught off guard by the overwhelming surge of pleasure that came from being surrounded by so many books. Histories and fantasies and romances and... everything under the sun and moon and stars... The lanky corvid shuddered slightly, eyes flashing under their paper mask. It was a relatively common library, as far as images went, but Imre had heard that there was something special hidden in the walls of books. A special book that was calling just for him, begging for him... and Imre was going to have it. Draped in a heavy cloak, Imre was just another patron. He was quiet, so the librarian didn't make a fuss about his shady clothing, and the rest of the cards visiting were too busy reading to really care about one lanky bird shuffle-hop-wandering through the library. An hour and a half later he had as many books as he could accommodate in his wings and a quiet corner to begin examining them all in, and examine he did. Time passed by like an illusion and the piles of books shifted and shrank and grew and... WHAM! Out of nowhere Imre's quiet research was disrupted as a small furry body slammed into him and went toppling into the wall, taking his cloak with her in a flutter of fabric that ended in the sound of sugar glider meeting wall. Imre didn't move, his eyes were wide but no one could see that, and across his face was scrawled, in an ancient but very neat penmanship, one of the most boring stanzas of poetry complimenting the gray shades of a Capital Street that Imre had ever seen. Pathetic really. |
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Post by Bee on Apr 27, 2009 14:10:12 GMT -5
Phaedra might have made a startled noise, but the sound was swallowed up by the lollypop that had gotten jammed halfway down her throat with the impact. She sputtered a bit and pulled it out. She disentangled herself from...a cloak.
Her face hurt. What the bloody deuce had she tripped over? Some patron irresponsibly left a pile of books on the ground over which innocent and unsuspecting sugar gliders could stumble?
No.
Phaedra looked at the bird with wide-eyed curiosity, brain too engaged by the oddity to berate him for her fall. He was a strange pattern of black and white, a little like a chessboard. And his marking looked white.
Also, he had no face.
Very, very curious.
Then she blinked. She must have smacked her head a little bit harder than she thought, because he was...blurring. She rubbed her temples.
"Oh dear," she muttered. She considered apologizing for not looking where she was going as she walked, but then she decided it was really his fault. People shouldn't lurk around in corners on the floor where people can trip over them.
Especially ones without faces.
She stared a little harder at the scrawl. It was difficult to make out without her glasses. Where were her glasses? Ah. Her tail brushed them. They were unbroken, thankfully.
"You have drab taste in verse."
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Post by Kari Muffin on May 6, 2009 17:25:28 GMT -5
(( OOC: Enter Ghost Shashi. <3 XD feel free to ignore me. )) Books. Books. Books. Shashi sighed to himself as he watched Imre do his work. He may had been able to read, but he was never really fond of the boring books that Imre decided to research. To each their own. Today was the bird's day after all. He had managed to come all this way even with a few snarky comments. Most of them were related to what happened to the rabbit's skin. He thought it was the most horrifying possible thing to do... but the bird had a valid point in the long run. Still. Being a backpack wasn't something planned. Even if it had a rather "cute" design using his ears as a strap and having his tail at the bottom. People wouldn't even assume it was real fur.... unless they really did believe in rabbits. His boredom was interrupted by the sudden clash between Imre and an Esterberry. It was pretty funny to watch at that. "She's hardly sorry Imre. She's an Esterberry woman after all. Totally thinks she's better than you." He snickered as he hovered closer to the bird. "Show her my skin. See if that sets her right." |
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Post by Vyn on May 6, 2009 19:54:36 GMT -5
It took Imre a few moments to recover from the shock of the collision and even longer to stop staring at the woman. Was she alright? She'd impacted with that wall rather heavily... He wouldn't be surprised if she'd broken a nose or something.
Quietly he shook himself off, fluffing up his feathers before laying them right once more. No harm done to himself. The beautiful bronze-tipped satchel was unscathed as well, which was equally as important as his person because it was also Shashi and he really didn't like the idea of something bad, worse, befalling his ghostly 'friend'.
And then he turned back to the Sugar Glider, who seemed not entirely worse for wear, and was assaulted by both of them talking at once. A little awkward. He shrugged absently to both of them and nodded his head a little. Yes, the poetry was quite drab and he was certain that the woman undeniably believed he was to blame for her lack of attention paid to where her feet went, but neither of those things mattered.
His motions were quick and well rehearsed, one talon dipped into the Shashi bag and grabbed pen and paper and quickly he scrawled a response to the Glider. Quite drab. Didn't write it. The act of dragging out the pen and paper had also brought the bag into view, just as Shashi had suggested, and Imre himself was a little curious as to what the woman might think. As an after thought, he added a second line. Are you alright? My books are fine.
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Post by Bee on May 11, 2009 21:46:45 GMT -5
Phaedra briefly processed the writing but her eyes were really on the satchel. It looked like an Esterberry child had been skinned and made into a pack. Of course, she knew that this sometimes happened with Aces (the great literary canon defend them from such terrible cruelty!), but to carry such an item around struck her as the height of tastelessness. Who the deuce walked around with something that barbaric?
There was always a small chance, of course, that the pack was entirely synthetic, and just patterned Esterberry for looks, but it still seemed crass.
"There's a decent probability that my face is going to bruise, but overall I am quite unscathed." She was mostly just thrilled her glasses weren't broken. Fuzzy, unreadable print was the stuff of nightmares. She eyed the Esterberry-patterned pack pointedly. "Where did you get that charming satchel, if you don't mind my inquiry? I was not aware that my region's pelt design was such a fashion statement in the capitol."
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Post by Vyn on Jun 6, 2010 15:33:28 GMT -5
Despite himself, he found a smile had crooked onto his beak. Not that she could see that, of course, and even if she was the attentive type it would hard to see the hint of a smile against the papery hide covering his beak.
It felt like an eternity of waiting through his curiosity but in all actually she had replied quite promptly. His grin didn't fade but he quickly sketched onto the notepad: Good to hear, bruises aren't bad. Imre had gotten into plenty of scrapes in The Wood, but that wasn't interesting. It was probably as interesting as the long, wordy poetry about concrete currently scrawled on his face. Shashi is not fashion, I found him in a tree near my home and a friend was kind enough to make him into a convenient bag so that he could accompany me on trips. Imre paused for a moment, gathering his thoughts and resting his talon before adding. He is very good for carrying books, Esterberries are full of knowledge.[/color] And to this he added a small happy face.
Shashi would enjoy this joke, Imre thought to himself, and that made his feathers puff up pleasantly.
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Post by Kari Muffin on Jun 7, 2010 22:18:36 GMT -5
Shashi peered over his haunt's shoulder with a curious expression. When he read the note he made huffing sound of disbelief.
Sometimes he regretted the fact that he had learned to read. Though he could hardly remember where he had learned to read from. His past had always been a bit of a blur, including his childhood. Who had he spent time with and all that crap?
Whatever. It didn't mater. Imre had made just about the lamest Esterberry handbag joke possible. His tail twitched as he stared at the Esterberry woman. Woman. Was that even the proper term? These cards had weird things going on with Gender. It made him shudder to think about it.
"I don't think she's going to be impressed by handbag jokes, you know? She seems the.... I'm smarter than you type." He titled his head to one side. "Among other things."
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Post by Bee on Jun 18, 2010 14:57:17 GMT -5
Phaedra looked at the faceless bird with a curious little tilt of her head. She twitched her glasses back up her nose. He had phrased that whole bit so oddly; perhaps there was some kind of cadence that was missing when one read something off a piece of paper instead of heard it from a voice.
Found him in a tree? Dead or alive? Had the little thing been alive when it was skinned? The bag looked too small to have been an adult of whatever animal it had been...had this bird killed a child? He seemed to speak of the bag as though it were something that could talk back to him. Perhaps he was just delusional. Either way, something's flesh...even an Ace...especially an Ace...
He seemed so sweet, though, for a mad person, even telling bad jokes. She kept on her guard. She didn't want to become his backpack.
"You're quite right," she said, brightly. "Though typically we keep it in our..." She eyed the bag. "...heads..."
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Post by Vyn on Jun 18, 2010 15:20:52 GMT -5
Imre was chuckling a little on the inside because he could see the confusion all over her pretty Esterberry face. Luckily, she couldn't see a bit of his. This was one of the few times he sort of enjoyed his paper mask.
It took her some time of sorting through her thoughts judging by the pause in her conversation but when he replied Imre cheerfully bobbed his head and replied: Shashi's the smartestonly rabbit I know but his head was too small to hold all my books, so I used the whole Pelt. Shashi had indeed been skinned alive, though not by Imre. No, Imre was not a child-murdering psychopath - just a bizarre collector that enjoyed making friends. Not that he'd known he'd be making a friend when he grabbed the pelt, but it was wonderfully good fortune that he had.
Anyway, enough awkward jokes about dead friends. Sorry talking is awkward - can't move my face around the paper - but I'm Imre he suddenly announced on the paper. You are?
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