[hr][center][color=silver]ℂ𝕠𝕝𝕝𝕒𝕓𝕠𝕣𝕒𝕥𝕚𝕠𝕟 ℙ𝕠𝕤𝕥   / /  [@Zombehs][@January][/color][/center][hr][hr][center][color=silver]𝕊𝕖𝕡𝕥. 𝟛, 𝟚𝟘𝟚𝟘   / /   𝕌𝕊𝔸ℝ𝕀𝕃ℕ 𝔼𝕒𝕤𝕥   / /   𝔸𝕣𝕓𝕠𝕣𝕖𝕥𝕦𝕞   / /  𝟚𝟙𝕩𝕩[/color][/center][hr]
Hector covered his mouth to stifle another laugh as Gregory prepped an attack. His eyes were black glass once more as communications between him and Miranda played like a movie reel in his mind.

With a cursory knowledge of what Gregory could do, Hector had a slight advantage.

[color=f7976a]"Shouldn't have tipped your hand to me~"[/color] he muttered to himself, the sing-song taunt catching automatically to [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ebyiyntVQNM]an old lullaby[/url] nudging at the borders of his consciousness.

Miranda smacked a three-meter-tall chunk of wood from a nearby tree with an audible crack, pitching the hunk of tree trunk at Gregory's general position before sliding to the right for another blindside.

A distinctly different sound called for Gregory to abandon his position and he jumped out of the way to the left, rolling to a stop some feet away. With the path broken, the rock shot forth and thunked uselessly against the massive chunk of wood, illuminating it for a brief moment as the glow faded. 

Flinching as it crashed into the ground and kicked up a spray of dirt, he scrambled to his feet just in time to see Miranda drift past its own projectile, buried partially in the ground, right at him. He would have liked his thoughts to race for a solution, but it was a mess up there at the moment. 

So, when an utterly insane idea came to mind, he didn’t take any time, time he didn’t have anyways, to weigh it out. A few steps back as if retreating from the approaching figure, before he rushed towards Miranda. Now he just needed to avoid the arms and not get skewered by her Licker tongue… 

Hector grinned. Miranda took the bait, moving forward at breakneck speed to meet Gregory. The Aberration boy considered actually breaking a particular neck, but refrained.

Miranda slipped just far enough left to catch Gregory by the upper arm as the two nearly collided. This time, though, instead of holding him or throwing him, it just gripped harder. And crushed the humerus.

He grimaced as Miranda maneuvered through the air without any sense of effort, snatching his arm as he nearly ran right past her. Jarred to a sudden halt, his eyes widened when the monster’s grip tightened around his upper arm. The rock clutched in the hand was released moments before he felt as the bone was ground to dust.

Even adrenaline wasn’t enough to dull the pain as he slumped to the forest floor, apparently intent on screaming his throat out. The pain was blinding, but it had not rendered him unconscious just yet. While one arm dangled uselessly in Miranda’s grasp, the other tried its best to trace a path on the ground next to Gregory. It wouldn’t be a long one, but maybe it’d be enough at point blank.

Miranda remained in place, face turned towards Gregory, curious about her victim's next move.

Clouded by pain, it took Gregory a few moments to realize that his hand that still worked moved meaninglessly over the forest floor. No glowing path trailed behind, nor was there a rock positioned to punch a hole through Miranda. [color=f26522]“Shit,”[/color] he croaked out, stumbling over the simple curse, as he stared up at the near-featureless face. 

[color=f26522][i]‘Must not have actually activated my power,’[/i][/color] he realized with surprising clarity as his free hand reached up to try and bap Miranda. A last desperate attempt with the hope that she didn’t really count as living and weighed about as much as she looked to.

The glowing hexagon inscribed in a dual-ringed circle appeared on Miranda's body, but the moment the spell activated, Gregory felt his entire body slump, as if a great weight had settled over his shoulders. Which it might as well have, since the meaning was clear even to his pain-addled mind; he wasn’t moving her in the slightest. Course the density probably also meant he didn’t actually have a way to hurt her… 

The glyph winked out as he released it, and he slumped even further in her grasp if that was even possible at this point. His free hand fumbled around him for something, but the fight seemed to have left him even as he grasped at the dropped rock.

Miranda released him, letting the dangling body drop completely as she moved back into the darkness. A hiss punctuated the brief silence that followed her departure. The game was still afoot. How many lives Gregory had was a number he would have to find out--one way or another.

Blinking away the stars that covered his vision when his mangled arm hit the floor, Gregory only really became aware of the other, lesser pains as he was left alone for a moment’s respite. Each breath was accompanied by a flare of pain that radiated from his gut. Of course it had reopened; it wasn’t even a fucking day old.

He considered just laying here for whatever was supposed to happen. Honestly did for a moment. Why the fuck was he trying so hard anyways? If he proved himself, they’d just send him out. And if he survived? They’d send him out on harder missions, until one day the dice came up in snake eyes and he didn’t come back. Assuming he was fortunate enough that a stroke of bad luck was what ended him…

Regardless of those thoughts, Gregory eventually propped himself up unsteadily. Thumping the rock into the soil next to him a few times, he didn’t want to roll over and die, but his options were narrowing. Standing up took an effort on its own, and he swayed a bit as he tried to gather his bearings again. Where the hell had he seen that flash?

Hector scratched his chin, mental eyes running through the film reel of events Miranda was sending his way. Ew. A deadweight. One of [i]those guys.[/i] Being a waste of oxygen was one thing, but being a waste of magic was quite another. Hector had to admit his power was one of the better ones, though, so he was just [i]a little biased[/i] against Gregory's lackluster participation. If Rosa had seen fit to give this newbie special treatment, then there had to be more than just some loser who would roll over at the first sign of defeat. But Rosa had always said that Hector was too mean to the other students.

[color=f7976a][i]"You need to play[/i] with [i]them, Hector, not with them."[/i][/color]

Rosa sucked at giving advice. But in some horribly right way, she made sense.

Hmm. Fine.

[color=f7976a]"What a party pooper,"[/color] he mumbled, crawling out of the recess in the tree. 

Tag, then. Because if Gregory gave up that easily, Hector would have to go back to his containment chamber (or get shot). And he hated that boring, white room with no windows. Sure, they had filled it up with knick-knacks and games after he had 'gotten better,' but what was the point of it all if he only had Miranda to play with? She wasn't even that fun. Especially not after she became stronger.

Near Gregory, Miranda began to make a clicking noise instead, like the sound of a tongue sucking against the roof of a mouth. Rhythmically. A metronome. Constantly telegraphing her position.

Before long, the clicks had relocated to Gregory's right and Miranda hovered just within range of the paltry moonlight filtering down through the foliage. She hissed again and feinted forward with an awkward lurch made only stranger by her particular brand of movement.

In the direction Miranda was facing, and far ahead of Gregory, Hector fumbled through the half-remembered lyrics of that "Clementine" lullaby he used to hear so often, deciding to just sing the chorus over and over again in a loud voice as he walked even further from Gregory's position.

[color=f7976a]"Oh, my darling, oh, my darling,
Oh, my darling Clementine. 
You are lost and gone forever, 
Dreadful sorry, Clementine."[/color] [hr] After a few moments, Gregory decided he prefered the silence to the noise Miranda was making. It let him keep track of where Miranda was, but only highlighted that there wasn’t any real escape as the source drifted around him. Grabbing at the shoulder of his broken arm to try and keep it from swinging about too much and blinding him with pain, he darted backwards as Miranda floated into the moonlight and towards him.

Off in the distance Gregory could hear a voice, though the words were distorted by the frantic pounding of his own heart as he tried to play keep away from Miranda’s grasp. Digging the front of his foot into the ground, he kicked up a spray of dirt and grass at it before he threw himself aside to put even just a bit of distance between them.

Rolling to his feet with only a sharp hiss of pain as adrenaline temporarily overcame his injuries, he bolted in the direction of Hector's voice even as he glanced towards Miranda.

The creature followed behind him at a leisurely pace, matching his speed, but not surpassing it. It remained just barely in sight, making sure Gregory was aware of what stopping or slowling down meant.

Hector, meanwhile, stopped singing as Gregory got closer. With a loud laugh, he broke into a run.

Since he couldn’t really do anything about it… Gregory ignored Miranda in favor of making sure he didn’t stumble over some roots and eat dirt. It was distant, but he could hear the sound of another’s footfalls as dry leaves crunched and sticks cracked. The sound of Hector’s laughter was… annoying, and he gripped his broken arm all the tighter as he ducked his head lower and picked up the pace. 

Once again, Miranda matched his pace, her distance behind him never increasing or decreasing. As she glided past a tree, she ripped a handful of wood from the trunk, casually pitching it at Gregory.

His initial urge was to dodge the projectile, but he pushed onward instead as he raised his one good hand. Eventually... something would hit him or the adrenaline high would run its course. If this didn't work, it just meant the game came to an end a bit quicker. 

Jagged edges and splinters dug into his palm as the chunk reached him, but he willed for his ability to manifest over it, claim it as his, and rip away the physics that otherwise would no doubt shatter his remaining good arm.

In his careless amusement, Hector didn't realize he had reached a dip in the forest floor and with a loud cry he found himself tumbling down the incline, rolling to a sprawling stop across a bed of branches and leaves. Aside from the dirt and vegetation covering him, his body sported no injuries. 

Behind Gregory, Miranda flickered repeatedly, synced to the thudding rustling of Hector's fall. With every flicker, the Gregory-form took on more scratches and bruises, until the noises ahead stopped.

Pouting, Hector scrambled to his feet and continued moving.

The sense of victory when his hand wasn't crushed faded quickly at the yell that came from ahead of him. Not from any concern for Hector, but the realization that this was a chance. Miranda's form flickered, injuries manifesting, but despite that it did not stop its advance. Releasing the stopped chunk with a muttered curse, he continued on after Hector's trail, careful not to fall down in the same way Miranda's controller evidently had.

Hector was out of breath. Being cooped up in one room for a year had the expected effect of rendering him out of shape, even with the boisterous energy of his age. He jogged away from Gregory at a slower pace, grumbling to himself about being a party pooper.

He spun around, hands on his hips even as he huffed and puffed for breath.

[color=f7976a]"Come at me, Clementine!"[/color] he hollered in Gregory's direction, signaling Miranda to screech wildly behind his opponent. The creature charged forward, closing the distance between itself and its prey.

He was closer than he thought from how cloes Hector sounded, but the screech behind him was hair-raising and he swallowed the panic as Miranda rushed towards him. Pushing into an outright sprint, he tried futilely for a few more moments to keep the distance between him and it from shortening.

Then he dug his heels in, tried to spin on a dime, and sucker punch the monster. His expression was resigned to a grimace as he gave the haymaker his all, fully expecting a broken hand for his efforts, but he needed the force to transfer to Hector.

Unfortunately, Miranda's damage was a one-way street and Gregory's fist met her open mouth head-on, punching all the way to the back of the creature's head and inflicting no damage. Miranda clamped down with her vertical maw and flung the student to the side with a flick of her neck, throwing him against a nearby tree. She had let go on the throw's finish, but the rows upon rows of jagged teeth had brutally marred Gregory's hand and his wrist.

Why the fuck had he ai- Whatever thought that might have been didn’t have a chance to finish as he felt Miranda’s blender of a jaw go to work. Any sensation beyond pain faded with a sharp crack as it wrenched him into the air and then into a tree by the hand. The impact drove his breath out in a sharp gasp, and he didn’t get back up when he hit the forest floor with a thump.

Miranda glided towards his prone form, bending over and prodding him experimentally. When Gregory didn't move, it hefted the boy over one shoulder and drfited towards Hector, who had now approached the two with an annoyed groan.

[color=f7976a]"Well, that's great! He's bleeding, too, just to make it look worse for me,"[/color] the Aberration grumbled like it was Gregory's fault for bleeding, huffing as he reached out to tug impetuously on Gregory's hair. [color=f7976a]"Stupid idiot."[/color]

Without any response from the unconscious student, Hector kicked at the dirt and picked his way through the underbrush back towards campus.

It wasn’t until he was slung over a shoulder that Gregory began to stir. Even when Hector yanked on his hair, he didn’t do much to resist the smaller child. While conscious, his injuries left him dazed and scattered his thoughts. Yet he somehow managed to spit out a winded, [color=f26522]"Redundant,"[/color] in response to the boy before he went limp in Miranda's grip again, slipping under from all that'd happened.