Look Out Below

[birthright_npc]

The night was clear and cold. A weather front had blown through the day prior and dropped the evening temps into the thirties. A pale sliver of last-quarter moon hung over the desert, its edges sharp, and only a few wisps of clouds obscured the stars. Into this stark landscape a meteor streaked just before midnight.

It landed on the outskirts of town at the end of a dirt path. The land was part of an old horse ranch, abandoned in the early 1970s, so no family emerged from the cabin to investigate the fiery hole in their property, and no animals paced nervously along the fences.

A cactus sizzled and popped as it caught fire near the crater.

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Look Out Below

[cian_oneill]

Cian's attention was torn between the two across the other side of the crater, the glow from said crater, and the sound, of someone, or something, behind him. Being downwind from the crater meant whoever was behind him was downwind of him, so he couldn't pick up the scent, especially with the assailing of his nose by the burnt scrub and dirt. And the two others.

He thought for a moment, then with one hand shoved in the pocket of his jacket, he moved closer to the crater, eyes watching the other two, ears tuned to whoever or whatever it was behind him.

"Made a bit of a hole," he said, the heat still intense but not enough to stop him from trying to peer over the edge at the contents of the crater.

Re: Look Out Below

[wolfs_daughter]

The shift back from animal to human didn't hurt as much now, not since Echo had been getting in touch with the Wolf. She could smell the burning cactus as she got dressed in the dark. There were voices coming from near the crater, but she couldn't really pick out the words from where she was. She clumsily put her feet back into her shoes, feeling thankful that she hadn't bothered with socks.

The hybrid warily approached the meteor's crash site, picking out three figures in the glare of headlights. When she recognized the motorcycle, her posture relaxed a single notch. The lone cactus was still smoldering, but the flames had died down. Her shirt was on backwards and inside out. She wasn't aware of it.

"Think there's gonna be more?"

Re: Look Out Below

[daniel_stacy]

Daniel was on the verge of exclaiming, 'Fuck, I hope not', but he was still keyed into the possibility that the first woman was an alien, and she might take that poorly. The last thing he needed was to get accused of species insensitivity in Echo's presence.

He squeezed the back of his neck and looked at the sky, then at the brunette again.

"Alright, I'm just gonna ask, does anybody know what that is? Could just be a meteor, but in this town, it's better to assume the weirdest."

[primordial_visitation]

The three of them had reasons to hide their more unusual talents. Sabra, however, suffered from no such inhibitions and, once having prowled around the crater, saw no reason not to simply lean up a good deal closer, slowly tilting head in curiosity. No doubt, she would have been much more at home with a tree branch to perch upon.

"Yes," she volunteered, either oblivious to the fact that Echo had met her before or deliberately ignoring it. More likely the former. Her attention was fixed firmly on the extraterrestrial visitor. "It is something which hatches..."

Quite what was being hatched, was not yet clear. But sure enough, a segment of that intensely hot exterior was cracking, allowing some sort of viscous, glowing liquid to ooze out.

Maybe they'd get lucky. Maybe it was just perfectly natural.

Something harmless visiting Searchlight... Right.

Re: Look Out Below

[cian_oneill]

Hatching?

Cian's curiosity got the better of him and he leaned closer, an arm held up to shield his face from some of the heat. But he couldn't see much, his eyes squinting almost shut against the glow that was starting to reach out from the crack that was forming.

"Bloody hell, what is it?" he said, having to step back and look away, blinking to get his vision back.

Re: Look Out Below

[wolfs_daughter]

"Space rocks."

Echo's voice was thoughtful when she said it. She'd been braced for hostility from Daniel, but when it didn't come she relaxed another notch and crouched down near the blackened earth. It was much warmer there, like a banked campfire, and her angular features were thrown into sharp relief by the glow.

"Maybe it's hollow," she suggested, speaking to the group in general. "Part of the tail end of a comet or something. Comets don't usually make stuff catch fire, though." The hybrid had the vague urge to poke it with a stick, but there were none nearby. She looked up at the sky. Stars twinkled down. They were a lot easier to look at than the glowing ball embedded in the bottom of the crater.

Re: Look Out Below

[daniel_stacy]

“Nnaaahh, I don’t think we’re that lucky,” he hedged. So far as he remembered from Astronomy 101, meteors didn’t drool gooey, irradiated fluid like a Cadbury egg. And god did it smell! He loosely tucked his nose into the crook of his arm. “Man, what is that stench?” Like fetid meat with a side of body odor. If anything crawled out of that mess, it wasn’t going to be attractive. That much Daniel had figured.

He looked around. He ought to grab a weapon in case things got hairy. He had no intention of using his fangs.

[primordial_visitation]

That was when Sabra turned to the other two, pointed down to the goop-covered rock and instructed them, "Taste it."

Totally matter-of-factly. Expectant, even, that at least one of them would see her command through. That one of the pair would actually go down into the crater, scoop some of the glowing, glue-like substance out with their hand, put it in their mouth and report back on the flavour in care-free manner.

"Taste it."

Because repeating the request clearly made it much more understandable, right?