[PP-F15] Cat Burglar

[Teion 0]

"Hmm? Where's yours then?" The sound of an unfamiliar voice just over her shoulder caused Teion to jump nearly out of her skin. Spinning around, the amethyst-themed girl was met with quite a peculiar figure. Clad in a bright yellow tunic that stood out against the dark trees, his clothing was almost luminous in the dim natural lighting that carried across the thin fog in the air. "Good lord, could you not?" She pressed a hand against her chest in an attempt to steady her frantic heartbeat inside while she scowled at the NPC. A yellow cursor spun lazily over the brighter yellow hat that stood tall on his head. Unkempt locks of pale green hair poked out under its brim, and the strange man pinched a short section between a finger and a thumb as he shifted his weight and surveyed Teion quizzically. "C'mon, c'mon, it has to be around here somewhere..."

Her eyebrows only narrowed at his roundabout nature. She was only hesitant to ignore the man and continue on her way because the thought of turning her back on someone like him in a place like this felt even more unsettling than trying to figure out what he possibly wanted. "This place is creepy enough..." She mumbled under her breath before speaking up to address him properly. "Alright, so...wha'd'you want? You have a quest or something?" She was rather blunt. The strange man simply shook his head and gave her a tut-tut, but he seemed to perk up a second later. "Ouhh, there you are little cutie!" He clapped his hands together and grinned far too widely. Teion raised a brow, taking a hesitant step back. He was looking her way, but he was no longer looking at her. Her eyes were wary to tear away from him, but the temptation was too strong. She glanced to the side, only having to look a few inches aside before she spotted something on her shoulder that wasn't there before. "Jinx, what're you--" She had almost smiled, about to jokingly scold the shadowy familiar. Before she had the chance, she reflexively jumped again when the red-eyed cat became nothing more than a dark wisp, plucked away by the NPC's quick and terribly pale fingers.

"Yes! Wonderful!" He was jumping for joy in front of her. Despite Teion's confused and outraged expression, the man stuck out his heel and tipped his hat to her. "Thank you kindly, Miss, that was quite a find!"

@Pinball

[Pinball 1]

And in the far off distance was a boy, lying nestled within the roots of one of the tall and foreboding trees that blocked out the sky. There was a light fog that filled the thick and dense forest, draping around the tree trunks and clinging to his hair and face. The grey haze only contributed to the Floor's low visibility, the little natural light managing to break through the blackness of the woods losing itself in the fog. It was a moody floor, to be sure, and one that probably held sinister secrets in store for those few unfortunate souls who thought to seek them out. 

Truth be told, it probably wasn't the best place to sleep, especially when you just plopped down out in the open. 

Pinball's eyes slowly opened, and he found himself again in an unfamiliar place. He sat up, leaning forwards, and rubbed a hand across his face and through his hair. How many times was he going to wake up like this? Somewhere completely different than where he last remembered being. Without a proper place to stay, he usually slept out in the open, but he'd normally think to set up a camp when he did. But sleep didn't come easy, and lately he hadn't been sleeping at all. He'd stay awake until he couldn't walk anymore, and his last memories were in splashes of these random moments. Then he'd wake up, and uncomfortably come to terms with what just had happened. Rinse, wash, and repeat. 
He hated it. 

Pinball's hand drifted to his belt, where his jar hung by a leather cord. It was the jar that contained his ghostly companion - without a solid form, she could fit into tight spaces easily, and that made transport convenient. But it wasn't there. He looked to the side. If it wasn't on his waist, he would usually keep it laying right next to him. It wasn't there either. With a jolt he jumped to his feet, a spark of fear taking root in his chest. "Zomekko?" He took a step forwards, leaving his sword laying in the dirt as he searched for his companion. 
He couldn't lose her. She was the only one he could talk to. He didn't have anybody else. Pinball's casual fear gave way to panic. He shouted now. "Zomekko!" 
Pinball nearly slipped in the dirt as he stepped on something round and smooth. He looked down, and was met by a cracked and dull glass jar, its shine only just barely visible in the gloom. He bent over and picked it up. 
Empty. 

[Teion 0]

Something interrupted their already brief interaction. The man simply took on the expression of a child who'd been caught with his hand in the cookie jar, while Teion's head whipped around as the end of a faint shout echoed across the foggy forest. "What was..." She whispered half the question, but the motion beside her caught her attention again.

"Whoopsie! He must be awake." His fingertips hovered in front of his mouth to poorly conceal the childish grin that grew behind them. She looked back, brows turned up in confusion, concern, and quickly mixing into frustration and impatience. "What the hell's your deal?" She demanded. "If you've got some sh*tty quest hook or something, just get on with it." She shifted uncomfortably. Jinx's absence from her shoulder was both troubling and not--had the standoffish familiar simply melded back into her shadow, or had the unsettling man across from her really meddled in some way? Again, her brashness was met with another tut-tut, and a quick waggle of the NPC's finger.

He paused for a moment, thinking. "Hrmm, nope! Toodles!" His fingers danced through the air in a quick good-bye before he scampered off in the opposite direction. The man took two or three hurried steps and then clicked his heels together, bending at the knees and giving his whole body a small, exaggerated wiggle. Like a scene out of an old cartoon, he sprung from the ground and arced as one would off of a diving board. To her shock, the man didn't land, or sprawl out on the floor. Had he phased straight through it? Did he meld into the dirt, the shadows, did he simply stop existing? She blinked in absolute perplexity, and then cautiously moved forward. She used the toe of her boot to step gingerly, testing the ground in front of her before committing and putting her weight onto it. "What in the actual hell..."

[Pinball 1]

Pinball was running now, his boots carrying him through the fog and over the gnarled roots of trees, dark and ominous. His breathing heavy and his heart racing, Pinball's normally tired blue eyes, now wide with panic, jumped wildly from place to place, searching for any sign of his ghostly companion to no avail. Then he saw a figure in the distance, rubbing the dirt with their boot. He couldn't make anything else out other than out; colors and shape in the forest were muted and shadowy, and Pinball would have to get closer to make out more minute detail. 

But did he really want to? 

He was an orange player, hardly something somebody would want to see on a creepy floor like this. He slowed to a jog, and then a walk, wincing at the thought. On top of that, he had seen the posters; he was wanted for questioning by Hestia's little organization. Only for questioning, sure, but what happened after that? He doubted he'd be let go. He'd probably be imprisoned, somehow, though he had a bad feeling there were more than a few people who would call for blood... 
Bottom line, he wasn't a very nice guy. Pinball knew that. 

But, he wanted to find his cat. And if putting himself at risk meant getting her back, he'd do it. 
Pinball pushed forward, running again with renewed vigor, coming to an abrupt stop next to her, sudden and without warning. Out of breath and still visibly panicked, he spoke, his words hurried and slurred. "A cat! Have you seen my cat," he began quickly, holding his hands out in front of him, not really sure what to do with them, "she's like - foggy?" 
He glanced around. The whole floor was draped in fog. This frustrated him. Probably a sheepish entrance for somebody in such a rush. 

[Teion 0]

With the sound of shoes pounding against the ground some short distance away, she had more warning that someone was coming this time. Teion's head whipped around the moment she felt determined eyes on her, standing with one arm defensively raised when Pinball came to a hurried stop in front of her.  Her brows narrowed, wearing half a complex expression that she would say is 'just her face' that contained suspicion, confusion, frustration, and a splash of anxiety. He said the word 'cat' twice, and it took her a second to realize he was actively asking her about his own. Her jaw hung open, but her brain took a second to catch up with any words. "U-uhh, I don't, no, I don't think so,"

She hardly had time to take in the person that approached her. She was grateful for the lack of a weapon pointed in her direction as a stranger had come running up to her, walking alone, in an eerie forest just far enough from civilization, but she could hardly discern the fact that that hadn't been the case with how messily the gears in her head were trying to churn and process all the information given to them. His words were urgent and his face was desperate, but a second after her floundered reply she began to realize just how much of a deer in the headlights she must have looked.

Things were coming together. Now that this guy got his answer, he'd leave, right? Isn't that what she wanted? Something about the way Jinx seemed to vanish from her shoulder had a knot quickly forming in her stomach. Teion shook her head. "Err, wait--" She wasn't sure if he would have tossed her useless answer aside and angrily moved on, or hung his head in defeat. Either option seemed likely from his panicked face. "Uhh, I mean, there was a guy here," Her shoulders relaxed just half an inch, and she seemed to concentrate on explaining herself while she still had his attention. "Some creepy NPC. He didn't outright say it, but..." The knot in her stomach pulled itself tight without warning, and her hand suddenly flew up to drag through the air and hurriedly open her menus. "A cat," She mumbled. "A cat is your familiar?" Her eyes were locked on the scrolling text as she tried to get to whichever section of her UI that would give her the answers she wanted. She panned to her skills, inventory, then equipment until she stopped at a lighted square in the corner of the display. A vague silhouette of a featureless beast was printed on the background, underneath a foreboding red 'X', barring her from her familiar's stats. She tried to click on it anyway, but of course nothing happened. "Oh my God I think he took them."

[Pinball 1]

She doesn't think so? Well, that was reasonable, given that kind of explanation. 
Whatever, though. Pinball whirled around, his panic now turning to some weird, twisted form of anger as he readied himself to storm off. He had to hurry. 
"Err, wait--"
He stopped, and briefly his face wasn't angry or panicked. It was filled with genuine worry, like a parent who had lost their kid in a mall or a grocery store or something. But that, of course, was immediately replaced with one more mature. His eyebrows furrowed, he folded his arms and frowned as he listened to the girl's explanation. When she opened her UI to check something, Pinball had already pieced it together. He opened his own, dread clawing at his heart as he saw the bold "X" crossing out Zomekko's name and stats. 
He felt his nose curl, and as he closed his menu, his hand drifting to the sword on his belt... next to the empty jar hanging around his waist. He looked down the path he had just been running, past the purple-haired girl.

"Which way did he go?" 

[Teion 0]

She suddenly felt put on the spot. She internally tensed with eyes on her that she had very clearly asked for, and his question was a valid one that she was now obligated to answer. The problem was that she didn't like the only answer she had to give him. She made a face, for only a second, that said she knew she was going to sound stupid. Teion waved her hand through the air in front of her, shooing her menus away. "Uhh. Okay, I know just how dumb it sounds, but, he really did just vanish." She wished she had thought of any other way to say that. Or that she just had a truthful, more believable response. She was wasting more time than she was helping. "He just like, sank into the ground. I don't know if it was a secret path, or he's just, coded that way." She was defeated halfway into the expanded explanation she tried to provide.

She felt small and she didn't know why, and she didn't know which part of that frustrated her more. She had been wandering with unease nested in the pit of her stomach for the better part of an hour already as she tried to explore this foreboding forest. The realization that Jinx was gone now--taken from her--was sinking in and had her feeling worse. She could always message someone, asking for help. Burn a teleport crystal to get back to safety faster. She may have had the thin common ground with the stranger across from her, in that they'd both been robbed, but what was the point of continuing to hold up a stranger? Having a common goal, a common enemy, didn't always warrant an alliance. So what was it she wanted out of this exchange?

"He took mine, too. We...could head towards the nearest town. Ask around. We can't be the only people in the world to have a guy like that mess with us."

[Pinball 1]

"A secret path?" Pinball looked towards the ground, disbelief plainly etched across his face. He glanced at the girl, then back at the dirt, then sheepishly scraped his boot across the dirt, testing to see if it would actually give way to some secret passage. It didn't, and he threw his arms up, irritated. Of course it didn't! Why would it? Dumbass. 
But it was an NPC, by the sound of it. Players weren't coded. Pinball winced, painfully aware of how sluggish his thought process was. That's what you get for waking up and then running through the forest like an idiot. But he was desperate. The one feeling that wasn't either fading or horribly volatile was his desperation to get his familiar back. 
"Checking town? That's gonna be, uhh... a little difficult," he murmured. 
He hadn't been orange for a very long time, and Pinball was always quick to isolate himself when he did something wrong. He largely avoided towns and settlements, with a few exceptions. 
Plus, he was clumsy, and hiding wasn't something clumsy people did very well.
Pinball thought for a moment. I guess it's time for me to see just how inexperienced I am at this kinda thing. Sneaking around. 

He looked to the girl then, still a bit untrusting, and now a little suspicious. What were the odds of even meeting someone like this? Traveling alone, in this spooky looking forest, and having the same exact problem. And now she was talking like they were going to travel together. 
He spoke slowly, trying not to let his usual nervousness stop him from speaking fluidly. "You want me... to come with you?" 

[Teion 0]

Of course he questioned her, as if the things she was suggesting meant she was out of her mind. Teion reactively made a face, her lips pursing to signal the loss she was at. Finally, with this stranger calling her rationale into question, she got a chance to begin to take in the person that stood a few paces across from her. He looked younger than her, and at the same time more tired than her. He was cautious, but clearly concerned about his missing companion, both of which she could relate to. Then there was the one glaring thing that set their avatars apart. She noticed the orange color of his cursor as it spun over his head. She suddenly felt even sillier for implying that they work together to track down their stolen familiars, but another second later she felt conflicted again. A brand without context. It was even harder to discern what was the 'right' or 'wrong' choice in this situation.

"Uhm... If you want to." She confirmed flatly, feeling the tension in the air. She watched him for a second, though she was always terrible at maintaining eye contact, and then shifted her weight with how awkward she felt. "I mean, I'm not gonna bug you to help me." She tried to explain herself a bit further. Just, like... I'm not gonna pick a fight, I dunno if we're better off trying to track this guy down together." She held her hands up in front of her a moment for added measure. Another pause, and she still felt just as awkward. "I'm Teion, by the way."

[Pinball 1]

It was in the few moments following the small answer that Pinball realized that he might just be letting things get to him. 
What would Mars say right now? He'd probably tell him to calm down, to look at things rationally... in an unnecessarily rude way. Yeah, that's right. He needed to calm down. Pinball took a small, silent breath, and forced himself to relax. His brow unfurrowed and his shoulders went slack, and he tried to look at things... "rationally." 
She was right. She was making sense. He could hear Mars rambling about it now; she was in the exact predicament he was, so if they worked together, the chances they found their familiars were probably way better than what they'd be alone. Common sense, right? 
Plus, if this was some kind of hidden quest or event or something, there was always the possibility that they had to work together to progress... 

He shook himself out of his thought. Though he had only been lost in his head for a few seconds, it had felt like a few minutes. He quickly offered his own response, finally calming down a bit more, though he did still fidget, and he still couldn't quite bring himself to trust this woman fully. "Alright... yeah, we're probably better off - um - like that. Yeah." He almost threw a thumbs up. He paused for a second before hesitantly, awkwardly, extending his arm. There wasn't really a point in trying to hide his identity when he wasn't like - disguised or anything. 
"I'm Pinball." 

[Teion 0]

She shouldn't have smiled, but she did. It was small and a little crooked, but their exchange had her feeling some sort of sense of accomplishment. A flicker of warmth in her chest distracted her mind from the predicament at hand for just a moment, and her fingers curled where she had been holding her palms out in front of her chest in some kind of display of peace.

"Okay, so..." Recent events were still sinking in. There was a pang of sadness at the realization that her cat--as weird and stupid and insufferable as the creature could be--had been stolen away. She drew in her lips and pressed them into each other hard for just a moment, breathing in sharply through her nose and letting her hands fall back to her sides. "Right, uhh. Best thing I can think to do is ask around. If anyone's seen that guy before they might tell us where he is, or what his game is." She reiterated her impromptu plan, more thinking aloud for her own reassurance than ensuring her and Pinball were on the same page.

She willed her feet to start moving, and soon they were carrying her back in the direction of Kachirho. Or at least, she thought that was the direction she was moving. Teion only made it a few paces before the uncertainty got her to stop, impatiently scroll through her menus to summon the incomplete map data that she had of the floor, and start over again once she'd picked out the way that she'd came from earlier in the day.

"If you don't wanna go inside, I can meet you somewhere." Once one of the rope-bound elevators that led to the settlement were in view, Teion made the suggestion in a small voice.