Separation Anxiety (Ciroton)

“Man, you sure dream up some crappy places.” Jack was standing on top of Maya’s head, holding his arms out for balance and attempting to get a better view of the area.

The psychic pursed her lips at her bear’s comment, “I didn’t mean to. I’m not even sure what this place is suppose to be.” The trio was in some kind of city, much older compared to her modern city of Oakfield. The street were made of cobblestone and the carriages that rolled along it made quite a bit of racket. Lampposts lined the streets, not yet lit due to the sun hanging brightly in the sky. People were dressed in odd fashions, the women wearing dresses that covered every part of them and the men in tuxedos. It definitely wasn’t home.

Zoe was in the crook of Maya’s arm, trying her best to look like a normal stuffed animal. “It’s not even close to the 2000s, I can say that,” she mumbled, trying to not move her mouth too much. “And Jack, you are not helping us stay unnoticed.” Maya was standing in an alleyway with her bears, a little nervous about walking out into broad daylight with her appearance. However, that didn’t stop people from looking into the alley and gawking at her, though the teddy on her head was probably attracting more attention than her attire.

“Pfft! Like she’d look normal anyway in this place,” Jack retorted, plopping down on Maya’s head.

Zoe rolled her eyes, “You don’t have to make it worse.”

The psychic was still looking ahead into the street, getting more nervous every minute. People were not only stopping for the sole reason of staring but were starting to talk amongst themselves. With the worried expressions on their faces, Maya decided the crowd wasn’t interested in inviting her over for tea. “Let’s go,” she stated suddenly. Jack almost fell off her head when she spun and headed in the opposite direction.

He grabbed a chunk of hair, “Hey! At least give me some warning before you do that.” The teddy yanked the chunk for good measure but was ignored. He yanked harder, “Listen to me, dammit!”

“Stop pestering her,” Zoe scolded.

“Shut up!” He started pulling and tugging her hair until she stopped moving and flipped her up, nearly throwing him off.

“Did you say something?” Maya questioned. She had her face aimed at the sky and Jack was barely hanging by her hair, his mouth clenched in anger.

The female bear sighed, “He wasn’t talking about anything important.”

“Oh.” Maya flipped her head back up, knocking Jack into the back of it. He quickly crawled over onto her shoulder, muttering a good amount of curses at both of the girls.

“Hey! You!” A shouted came from being the trio. The teenager turned to see a pair of men walking towards her. It might have been a nice sight if they didn’t have narrowed eyes and grimaces on their faces. Their expressions only became harder when the teddy bears both moved of their own will.

Jack grinned. “Quick, Maya!” he shouted, pointing at the two men, “Knock them back! They want to take us away from you!” Panic easily gripped the psychic. Before Zoe could convince her otherwise, the teenager held up her hand and flung the men backwards with her telekinesis.

“Oh no,” Zoe put her head in her hands and shook them back and forth, “That was probably the worse thing you could’ve done.”

“Heheh. I think it was pretty good. Nice job.” Jack smirked at the prone forms of the men.

Maya perked up at the bear’s compliment, “Thanks.” Then her expression turned into a stubborn pout, “But I’d never let them take you away from me.”

However, it was at that point that several more people entered the alley. They gaped at the two unconscious men and then turned furious eyes onto her, “Stop her!”

The psychic took a step back, unsure of what was happening. “Run, Maya!” Zoe urged, losing any pretensions of being a normal toy. Maya turned once again and ran full speed through the alley, which, unfortunately, wasn’t very fast. The crowd easily kept pace and a couple men even gained. As the trio bursted into the street, the human’s foot caught on the uneven sidewalk and she went sprawling into several other people. Jack and Zoe flung from her, landing several feet away. Chunks of the sidewalk came apart and flew into the air as panic took control of Maya’s psychic power. “Stay back. I won’t let you have them.”

If life on the road taught one thing to the lone female traveler, it had to be that everything began to look the same after a while. Same old trees, same old buildings, same old monsters to destroy. It took times like this to make her remember that she did regret her decision to leave home, but chances were it’d be the same, but with less travel and more kids running about. Still, her hopes for something different came to fruition when she saw the sign welcoming her to a lavish, clean English town.

… And here we are in Generic Village #23597, she thought dryly as she passed. Long ago she trained her mind to distance itself from trivial differences such as names, or even titles, given to them. Besides, it seemed like no one cared if she didn’t know the town’s name or not, so why even bother to appease the locals.

Another busy town market met the weary traveler’s eyes as she walked down the cobblestone streets and oil street lamps. Obviously, this town had to have a great source of wealth to have something that sophisticated in the 1300’s, at least, that was what the church called this time. However, under the apparent face of a busy town came a brooding sense of fear somewhere between the buildings.

“Stop her!” Came the shout of a random, male villager. Turning towards the source of the sound, she walked over to a nearby alley and saw a whole mob of people chasing after a woman no more then twenty years old. However, what caught her attention the most were a pair of peculiar, brown pieces of woven fabric reminiscent of bears.

Kristina watched on as the woman tripped on the uneven sidewalk, causing her to fall to the ground, and onto several other people. However, she paid both her, and her fallen items no mind as she got up to face the crowd, pieces of sidewalk floating into the air. “Stay back,” she said to the mob that pursued her so. “I won’t let you have them.”

The demon hunter looked down on the fallen items curiously, rapidly coming to the conclusion that they posed on threat. Then why would she be so determined to protect them when she herself had the ungodly powers to levitate stone? Still, playing on the safe side, the hunter pulled out an arrow from her quiver, and notched it on her bow, not pulling back on it yet.

However, the sight of the two fluffy creatures running towards the girl on their own made her reconsider her previous stance, causing her to pull back on the bowstring, even if only a little bit. One person in the crowd, undoubtedly smarter then your average peasant, looked upon her with thanksgiving and adoration. “Praise the lord, for he has seen fit to deliver unto us a hunter to purge this demon from our pristine village!”

Suddenly, all eyes were on her, even the woman who they chased and the beady eyes of the little creatures standing behind her legs. Kris hadn’t had any place to rest, or money in her purse for weeks. Surely, if they were willing to pay she could send this demon to a swift grave… but she still looked disturbingly human for her to take on such a task. Indeed, she could not make the decision lightly.

OoC: *scrapes rust off*

BiC:

Jack turned to the villagers, “Demon? I’ll give ya a demon to worry to worry about.” He started to run at the man who had called on the hunter, not that he would be able to do any damage, when Zoe grabbed him and yanked him back.

“Oh for the love of- would you stop trying to get us in a worse situation,” she scolded the bear while struggling to keep him in one spot.

“Uh, Zoe?” Maya interrupted. The pieces of sidewalk clattered against the ground as she forgot about the villagers. Her gaze was fixed directly on the female who had stumbled upon the scene. “She has a bow and arrow. Should I be worried?” While the psychic didn’t have any personal experience with bows, she was pretty sure it would hurt if an arrow was fired at her.

The man who had called on Kris stepped forward and addressed the hunter again, “Please, you must rid us of this unnatural creature. She how these toys move and talk as if alive. Their very existence is a threat. And no human can move stone without touching it. If you don’t destroy them, our village will be destroyed!”

The angelic bear jumped up and pointed her paw at the man, “And who said we were going to attack you? You came after us first.” But the teenager heard enough. She lunged forward, grabbed the two bears, and started running down the street. Cry of outrage sounded only a second later. It didn’t matter if they came after her, though, as long as they didn’t catch her. I wonder if that one lady will. She looked nice but... Her thoughts turned back to the bow and arrow, I bet that would hurt.

An unsettling storm of confusion filled the hunters’ mind. The little girl looked perfectly human, so she had no obligation to destroy her if she had done nothing wrong. Yet she could be lying and have brought harm to the village, in which case she had to take action. She stood like a rock against the river of villages that ran past, some shouting at her to take action, others just ignoring her.

Kristina reached into her pockets, leaving it up to God if she should intervene or not. The feeling of cold metal didn’t meet her grasp as she dug in her pockets.

It was a shame demon hunters couldn’t stay or eat free anywhere they wanted. She would have half the cases she normally took on, if that were the case. However, the image of her starving in the middle of the woods quickly came to mind. Villages were few and far between in the area, meaning it could be days before she found another. She made her choice.

Aiming above the crowd that passed, she pulled back on the string of her bow while trying to picture the little girl as nothing more then a viscous demon in the guise of a sweet and innocent little girl, probably one that it killed to make the costume. As images came to mind, she let the arrow go and fly where it may as she ran to get in front of the crowd.

(Rusty thread is rusty. =/)

“Oh, pretty.” Maya stared through the shop’s front windows, admiring the dresses on the display mannequins. They all had long sleeves and high collars; the kind of dresses that covered everything except the hands and head. Some were layered with ruffles and cloth drapes but others had a simple design.

A paw came up and tapped the human on the head. “Uh, we’re being chased, remember?” Zoe politely stated.

She cocked her head, “Chase? By whom?” Both bears let out large sighs. “Ah, come on. How would want to come after me?” the girl chuckled. At that point, a bow twanged, letting an arrow fly straight at the psychic. However, the arrow came to a complete stop in the air and dropped to the ground, blocked by Maya telekinesis. She looked at the arrow and then at the person who was holding the bow. “You look familiar.”

“Argh!” Jack shouted, “she’s the person these stupid people asked to attack you!” Then he lowered his voice, “For no reason whatsoever.”

“Oh yeah,” Maya hopped up and down with a cheerful expression, “you’re a demon hunter. That’s pretty cool, you know. So I’m not really interested in fighting you. Hm...” She turned to the dress shop, “Oh, I know.” Directing her telekinesis to one of the mannequins, she caused to twitch slightly, move its head, and then leap through the window. Glass sprayed out as the dummy landed in front of the psychic and turned to face Kristina.

Okay, so the girl wasn’t a demon. However, Kristina wasn’t pleased by this turn of events. Witches, which this little girl was, were notoriously more difficult to defeat. The fact the church wanted them alive didn’t help either. She’d never even tried to tackle a witch by herself before, since they required special hunters: Witch Hunters.

However, the woman had the feeling she was the only one with any experience around witches before. Besides, the girl was pretty young, so she must not have had full command of her powers yet. Although, she had to admit she was surprised a witch so young could already breathe motion into an inanimate object.

The lifeless doll formed a shield around its master, bent on protecting her with every fiber of its soulless being. It wasted no time, bravely bounding forward to stop the defender of God’s will. A hunter with no experience would have panicked, but Kris knew the witch had to keep her concentration. As the doll ran in closer, the hunter leapt high into the air, over the doll and in front of the child, shooting around a dozen arrows, hoping that would be enough to stall her.

The ploy worked, as the witch stopped all the arrows with her magic. Quickly, the doll fell down, as did the arrows. “I know you witches need to concentrate, you know!” Kristina called to her. The child quickly took flight into the small alleys of the town, the hunter in tow.