Isa shrinks back down to normal in the span of less than half a second. She seems almost relieved at not being in that form.
(Then again, she's almost bigger than the room in that other form. So maybe it's just a matter of it being uncomfortable or something. Jesse can imagine it would be rather uncomfortable to be crammed into a space that you can barely fit in without contorting into thirty different yoga poses at once.
Now they're wondering if she does yoga. Wonderful.)
"On the contrary, most demons don't look like a giant monster made out of clay. Most of them, while having frightening appearances, do still have more human elements."
Isa rolls her eyes, for some reason. "I've heard so many demons complain about how much 'lesser' that seems, but then they're the ones going around looking like humans."
Ah, that's why.
Mevia snorts. "They're a bunch of bloody hypocrites."
"What the extended, heavy radiation does," Isa resumes after giving a single rather emphatic nod to that statement, "is that it changes our true form. Extra eyes, extra appendages, sometimes mutating the size of limbs or the appearance of 'skin' or 'hair'. Perhaps to the contrary of what many think, I didn't always have six tails and four eyes. And I'm not supposed to be that big."
Jesse thumbs the corner of their mouth, taking that into consideration. "I see..."
"For us lords, the radiation isn't that bad, because it amplifies the power we already have and that helps to nullify the unbalancing or sometimes detrimental effects of developing scales or skin, extra limbs that could potentially be horribly unbalancing, or an extra eye that could add too much perspective."
Mevia picks up now. "But many of the inhabitants in Sky City find that those extra effects give them a distinct disadvantage in battles in that form, and unfortunately those disadvantages sometimes carries into their more human form. We had one demon who grew a third arm in the center of their chest, and even in their human form it caused lung and heart problems until they died."
"It wasn't very soon afterwards. They were in a fight. That extra arm was a hindrance even when it wasn't physically present," Isa adds quite bluntly.
"... I see..." Jesse feels as though they've been saying 'I see' too much.
"Water." Harper taps her lip and shakes her head. "Worse."
"Oh, yes, the water carries the radiation more heavily. As bad as it is to inhale the radiation and be sitting in basically a stewpot of magical radiation all day," Mevia picks up again, "it's even worse to actually ingest it as though it were water, at least to newcomers, and can actually be dangerous in that amount of concentration. The citizens of Sky City are used to it, and to a point the smoke or simply having the radiation on one's skin helps to nullify the effects and make them a little less violent."
Jesse has to wonder how Mevia managed to get all of that out of two words.
"But neutralizing the radiation could potentially reduce some of the side effects," Isa chimes in.
"Stop picking up perfectly, it's creepy," Gill murmurs to himself a bit louder than he perhaps intended.
Maya stamps on his foot.
"Or even reverse them," Isa continues, perhaps ignoring the way Gill is now cussing and hopping up and down in pain. "To a point, it could make it safer to live here without worrying about the effects of the radiation, or at least have a more solid method of stopping it from getting to the point where it could be dangerous even in our human forms."
"Which is why something immensely powerful could be helpful to us," Mevia agrees. "With that power, it could just stop the radiation from getting worse."
Lukas gives the three lords a pleasant smile and a slight incline of the head. "If that is the reason you three are looking to capture the creature, then I suppose we wouldn't mind helping out. It's only fair."
"Thank you," Harper utters, but she's smiling in faint relief.
(Perhaps she was thinking they would say no. They can't really blame her.)
"In that case, we leaving Jesse here?" Gill asks, cocking his head to the side. "I mean, I'm sure they'd be safe in the palace, but I don't know most of the guards, and I'm not sure how comfortable I am leaving them in a crowd of demons that very much would like to eat them."
Maya frowns, crossing her arms. "Oh, that's true... and we can hardly have Isa or Mevia tote them around, they're all pretty busy and I dunno how long it's going to take..."
Petra glances down at them as Jesse timidly pipes up, twisting their fingers slightly while Reuben snuffles happily in their grip. "I... um... I wanna come, too."
Harper's smile turns down at the corners into a slight frown. "Safe?"
"I don't know... it could be dangerous for a human to just sort of be shoved in there," Mevia frowns, rubbing a finger along her jaw as she stares hard at the human. "For both you and everyone involved."
Jesse purses their lips slightly, tilting their head to one side. "I can just run away from the creature, if it comes to it... or hide."
"You would be very good at hiding," Aiden replies drily, but Isa's got her arms crossed and is frowning at Jesse now.
"It'd be pretty dangerous, unless you're very quick and can move quickly..."
She ponders this for a moment, before cocking her head at them and giving them a lopsided smile. "Why don't we try something? If you can get through a challenge of ours without getting hit, you can go along with them. Otherwise we'll have to figure something else out, since... if you're still, I imagine Romeo would be quite angry about you ending up dead."
Jesse blinks a couple of times at this.
"What's the challenge?"
Harper crosses her arms, giving Mevia a pondering sort of look. "Agility?"
"Agility could work..." Mevia glances at Isa, a question in her eyes. Upon receiving Isa's nod, she turns back to Jesse.
"We would put you through a challenge that would test how well you can dodge. The creature is powerful enough that shielding would probably result in simply shattering the shield, so it would be more of a test of your reflexes and speed to make sure you'd be able to dodge the creature's attacks. I assume you're not going to actually be fighting," she adds.
Jesse shakes their head quite rapidly at that. "No, I would die instantly."
"You're not wrong," Aiden mumbles under his breath.
Lukas steps on his foot.
"Then it would be best to make sure you have the ability to move out of the way quickly if necessary," Isa picks up, shooting Aiden a faintly amused look as he hops up and down and swears quietly, glaring halfheartedly at Lukas the whole time. "We won't use any real weapons or attacks. It would just be a test of reflexes and speed."
Jesse blinks at her.
... well, they can run pretty quick... and their reflexes aren't that bad, really.
"... okay."
"Ready?"
"No."
Isa can't help but smile at the response from the tiny human standing at the other end of the hallway. They're quite hard to see, except for a little fuzzy black jacket and their fluffy hair. "We're not going to hurt you. If anything the weapons will give you a small bruise, but they're practice weapons and not that bad."
"... I'm still not ready."
Aiden snorts from where he is behind the wooden fenced-off area that they're standing in, and Mevia laughs at that. Actually laughs. "Fair enough, but we gotta do it anyway."
"Okay."
Harper is giving Jesse a rather amused/fond/sad sort of look, before her red-and-gray eyes flicker to the other two.
They're adorable.
Isa's lips quirk into a smile, eyes gravitating over to Jesse.
They are, she responds mentally as well. They'll probably go for me or Harper, since we are less threatening than you are, Mevia.
You appear less threatening.
Isa resists the urge to roll her eyes. Fine. We appear less threatening. But the fact remains that they'll most likely head for us, so we should keep our attacks in that area.
Harper nods and looks back at Jesse. "Jesse, are you ready now?"
"No, but we can start..."
At least they're honest.
The thought goes through all three women's heads at the same time, before Isa lifts her hand. "Let us begin, then," she says simply.
The human lifts their hand and gives a thumbs' up.
Mevia's wrist quirks, and a wooden axe is suddenly spinning over and over, sailing in a would-be-deadly-if-it-was-real arc at Jesse-
Jesse skips sideways, the axe clacking and spinning as it bounces on the floor harmlessly before it zips off of the floor and back into Mevia's grip.
Jesse looks at where the axe was, about three feet from where they are standing now, then back up at the three.
They start to jog towards the three lords.
Several small, mechanical bundles of redstone fly from Harper's hand. Jesse breaks into a near-sprint, abruptly going from ten to a hundred and dashing across the hallway as they manage to hop, skip, and tumble around one of the redstone bundles and avoid tripping and falling flat on their face.
A minute later, all of the bundles detonate, spraying a fine spray of gunpowder everywhere.
Not another minute later, the entire mess gives off several tiny, popping explosions.
Jesse's going in a full-out sprint now, ignoring the tiny explosions, already having reached the halfway point.
Isa shifts and then leaps forward from where she's standing in the center of the three, a flicker of light on wood changing in her hands as she shoots forward-
Jesse has barely touched down into their next step before they're sidestepping a wooden blade sweeping through the air, right through where they were moments before and narrowly missing thwacking painfully into their head.
Isa's red eyes flicker down, and she launches herself backwards, making Jesse do a backwards tumble as the resulting wind from the jump is strong enough to bowl them over.
The tumble doesn't break their momentum, though, as the moment their feet touch down solidly they are digging into the ground before spitting them forward rapidly.
Lukas hums thoughtfully, leaning forward and resting his chin on his hand. "Huh. They're doing a good job. Most people would've gotten knocked out already..."
A wooden axe comes boomeranging at Jesse, and they've barely ducked under it, the wood spinning wildly as it sails up into the air, before they twist their foot to one side and roll in midair, the redstone bundle soaring an inch over their shoulder.
They plop to the floor and roll sideways as the axe spins back around, wheeling through the air above them and back into Mevia's grip, but they don't wait to watch that happen and are already up on their feet again as the 'bomb' pops behind them.
... they're doing a good job.
Yes. Good reflexes. Mevia hefts her axe before winding up to throw it at them and flicking her wrist-
Jesse dives to the left, rather than flinching as was Mevia's intention, since Harper's next bomb (toy? Mevia's not sure) goes flying straight over them, skittering across the floor and exploding in a small series of pops and sparks that fizzle out against the floor.
Jesse's crossed three-quarters of the room, and they're sprinting directly for Harper.
Isa gives her wrist a little shake, the blade of the wooden sword in her right hand sliding out of the hilt-
- and continuing to, until it's about the size of a small tree.
Maya whistles, giving a sage nod. "Damn. They're pulling out the big guns now. Longest anyone's survived in this challenge."
Aiden thumbs the corner of his mouth. "They are small, but... I guess it's like watching a squirrel run up a tree. The things are fucking quick."
The wooden sword reacts to the tiniest twitch of Isa's wrist, slamming heavily into the floor inches from Jesse, but the tiny human doesn't flinch or balk at the violent motion, even as the wood of the blade crumples from the impact slightly, and instead just vaults over it and sprints for Harper.
... have they had practice fighting before?
Harper tugs out an object that she honestly would have to call something along the lines of a sci-fi blaster, flicking a few switches to turn it to a safer mode and then raising it to point at Jesse.
They seem to be quite good at dodging.
She shoots.
The laser is a harmless beam that honestly will do nothing more than tickle, but it doesn't matter because it completely misses, Jesse ducking down while continuing their sprint before shooting forward like a bullet, still making their way across the hall.
Almost there.
Harper hums, tilting her head slightly and giving them an appraising sort of look before flicking another switch.
Gill blinks. "Oh, that switch..."
Petra glances at him, almost seeming reluctant to take her eyes off of the high-speed one-sided fight where Jesse is ducking and dodging around like a pinball. "You know what it does?"
Harper fires again, but this time the lasers that come out spit out much faster now, several blurs and flashes of movement coming about a millisecond apart, glowing shots of light peppering the air in a blur.
"Yeah, she showed it to me once. I guess she finished her machine gun function."
The human dives forward into a roll, ending up on their feet and practically throwing themselves sideways not a few seconds later in a sort of bizarre cartwheel, narrowly avoiding more of those flashing lasers that burst harmlessly on the wall behind them.
Isa flicks her wrist, wheeling the huge sword around in a motion that makes the wind rush around them, rustling the human's fluffy hair, before arcing down-
The human bolts forward.
There is a small space between the two that the human shoots through, almost as though fired from a cannon, their movement sending them halfway across the room in a single motion.
Harper's arm lowers as she turns to look at them.
... oh.
Isa glances at her at the thought that flits through Harper's head and is shared by the other two.
That was clever.
In a flying leap, the human manages to cross the rest of the space needled to tackle Mevia back a step, arms locking around her tightly in a sort of rough hug.
The last few lasers burst against the wall, leaving the room in disarray without looking as though it was torn apart.
Lukas whistles slightly, drumming his fingers on the fence while Gill, Maya, Aiden, and Petra stare wordlessly at the human, mouths all hanging open. "Well, they're a bundle of surprises, aren't they."
Mevia blinks down at the tiny human currently hugging her around the midriff, panting like a tiny puppy and trembling from where they're hugging her tightly, before a ghost of a smile quirks over her mouth and she pats them on the back.
"Good job."
Jesse gives her a small thumbs' up, still trembling in her grip from where they're clinging to her.
Harper gently pulls Jesse off of Mevia and lifts them up to eye height.
Their eyes are slightly glazed over with the effort of exertion, but they also have a slightly frightened expression on their face from perhaps the violence of the attacks, regardless of the fact that none of the weapons were really real weapons.
She pokes their cheek.
They blink glazed eyes without really reacting.
She gives a sigh and pulls them to her in a sort of awkward hug. "Oh, gravel."
A/N: Jesse's very good at dodging and fighting; but only close-combat and most of their skill is in dodging and running away. There is a reason for this.
And no, the reason is not that Jesse has superpowers. xD
Responses to reviews!
ThinMintE06: Not quite xD / No, it will definitely not xD / Indeed x3
TheAmberShadow: No, not quite. Basilisks are the reverse of cockatrices; they are born from the egg of a serpent or a toad and then hatched by the rooster. Cockatrices are born from the egg of a rooster (which is impossible but whatever) and then hatched by the serpent or toad.
Darkbeast Dend: Thank you!
That's it for now! See ya, so long, and g'bye!
x.X. A.L. X.x
