Chapter 5: Girl Scout camping trip?—Onyx POV
As I continue chowing down on my dried fruit, the whistling noise finally stops. Raising my head slightly, I morph my ears back into bat ears, just to be sure. Nothing. Now, of course, my feral side wants for me to go find out what stopped it. Driven purely by instincts, I once again leave the dark, cool, safe haven of my cave to investigate.
With the painful sound gone, at least now I can concentrate. The down side being that with the sound gone, I can't hear where it's coming from. Fortunately, for that there's an easy solution.
I close my eyes, and outstretch a fist. Pressing my closed hand to my mouth, I can send out ultrasonic pulses, making a "map" of sorts inside of my head out of sound. This is both simpler to use than normal vision; it lacks colors so shapes are easily distinguishable, and more efficient in that I can "see" with my ears for much farther than with my eyes.
The sound builds a three dimensional image of the land under me, hills, water, ledges. Ledges, water, hills. A bush. A few stray sound waves, coming from an elegant house boat with a water slide. More water. A floating log. Another bush. The same patterns repeat over and over. I'm starting to think that maybe I was just imagining the sound when I see/hear a large group of bodies, vaguely human shaped. A Girl Scout camping trip? Unlikely.
I hover for a few moments, debating if I should check it out, or hang back. In the end the half of me that wants to find out about the clump of bodies wins out. Keeping the sound map in my head, I scope out their location until I'm pretty sure that I could see them with my actual eyes.
I feel my face tighten, my sea foam blue eyes widen, and fear kicks every sense I have into overdrive.
Crap.