Thread: Searching~! || mxm preferred, but not essential

A few unloved starting posts Workday of the Modern Necromancer The call came at five am, a little before dawn. Some stupid default ringtone on a phone that was far enough from the bed for him to actually have to get out of bed, stepping on the cold floor. It woke him right up. What a stupid job. Why couldn't he get something with normal work hours? Dominic gave a few nuts to his lovebirds to shut them the hell up turning on the light had woken them, and he had a headache. Chirping was only cute for the first month of owning them, and familiars had a tendency to live hell of a time longer. While they had their breakfast, he managed to get into the shower, sort out his hair and get dressed. Long and black once he had grown a beard, but it really didn't work out. Now he just wore his hair in a ponytail. It was presentable and that was sufficient. Most necromancers made the error of looking like undertakers, but Dominic worked very hard at not doing so. It made him look like a tramp. He'd never learned any other look. Dark trousers, a shirt that wasn't well ironed, and some work boots, just in case someone dropped something heavy on his toes. It happened surprisingly often. By the time he was getting out of the door, it was dawn and both the birds were perching on his head while he was attempting to eat toast with no hands. Five minutes later, he had to come back because he realised that he had forgotten his wallet and his car keys, but he was still ahead of schedule. He didn't need to even lock his door the few symbols carved into the doorframe and painted with dark ink deterred thieves very well. No one wanted to rob a dark mage they tended to keep strange and dangerous guardians. Around six, he arrived at the scene, flashing the ID Dominic Ellis, licenced necromancer, police consultant and stepping under the tape. It was still a little bit early to have a crowd of onlookers, and the police was so far efficient at shooing the interested away. A few steps into the alleyway, and even he had to stop in surprise. He had never seen a corpse chopped into so many pieces... Oh, wow. He didn't know if he was impressed or horrified. Both of his bright green birds sidled up to each other on his shoulder with a sort of sad cheep. Hours of overtime, no doubt. An Interesting Catch in the Time of Industrial Fishing The net was almost invisible in the dark, and he swam into it without seeing it. He was tangled before he even realised what had happened, and the net was a cruel one, cutting into his flesh. Panicking, he struggled against it and suddenly realised that he was taking in specks of his own blood through his gills. These were unfamiliar waters for him. An exile had to be an exile. He had no way of knowing where the nets had been placed, and he had been swimming closer to the surface to avoid predators that stalked the deeps. There had been no scent marks that could tell him what way to go... Even if there had been, he could not have followed them. It took a long time to calm down, for his heartbeat to slow down again. Brute force had done nothing for him. His tail, his hair, one of his arms... All wound through the net, so he could barely move. The ropes were so thin, he could never have seen them, not even in the day. He exhaled a few bubbles then realised his only option was to take his teeth to the net. It was hard work, seeing as his teeth were made to rip rather than gnaw. His jaw was a collection of needle sharp incisors, nothing like human teeth. He was nowhere near done when the net began to be hauled up close to dawn, the usual working hours of fishermen. He renewed his struggle, but it was far too late. Odd how horrible it was to taste air when he was not prepared for it. The comfort of the seawater was suddenly gone, and for the moment, he was no better than any of the fish, twisting and gasping on a deck that stank of blood. He vomited the contents of his stomach first, and then the water from his lungs, hacking at the air that felt like stabs to the sides of his ribs. It was a while before the slits oozed the gel that would keep them closed and that would let him breathe the air. He was far less human than fairytale illustrations suggested. His tailfin was massive, but it was sticking to itself in the warm air, becoming narrow and sharp instead. There were spikes running all the way down his spine, some of them looking genuinely sharp, and his hands were clawed. Those claws scrambled and scored the deck. Almost everything of him was scaled, except his shoulders and his face, but the skin there was bluish, and his eyes were almost pure black, with no white visible at all. The stories were right in one aspect mer-people did have long flowing hair, that was now stuck across his face and back. His was almost pure white, matching the scales across his stomach. The rest of him was patterned in what would be brilliant blues underwater, but looked like dull cobalts instead. Now, and only now, could he be able to look at more than the deck of the ship, raising himself on still-shaking arms. He had seen humans before, sometimes drowned, sometimes lost at sea. Merfolk helped the living, when they could, but this was a different situation. He was at the mercy of humans instead. He did not trust that at all. Vodyanoy in the City The river was filthy. Dank sewer tunnels emptied themselves onto grey sand, and there were few fish in algae filled waters. Long strands flourished in garbage, coiling through discarded shopping trolleys, cars, through bones. The passage of water wore glass into smooth pebbles of brilliant colours, but people never saw those. All they could see was the brown opaque water. He didn't have to use his eyes to see. He could see the eel pass through the ribcage of a never-found murder victim without ever leaving his little home. The humans often made regeneration plans, promised to reroute the sewers, clean up the water, bring the fish back, build new footpaths and parks in the docks district... But often they just ended up deciding it was just too expensive. So the empty factories and warehouses always stood, as grey as the water, and as devoid of life as it was. The old docks machinery rusted and fell to pieces where it stood. His empty domain. Seawater was poisonous to him, so he could not take that path. If he strayed too far from his waters, he lost his powers, his very essence... It wasn't even a proper death. He faded a little, sure, but there was still a mind there. He dried up like one of those fishes. The sort that slept through droughts and awoke as soon as rains fell... He had seen stories of them. It was not oblivion. He had no choice but to exist. But eternity could be made comfortable. Under a dark pier, he made his home. A grotto of strangely lit crystals and delicate glasses full of floating little lights. Bone servants, held together with magic, in strange unreal forms. A long time ago, sailors and fishermen would tip a little tobacco into the water lord Fishbones, do not be angry but these days he was reduced to searching suicides and dumped corpses. He would lay out the sodden cigarettes and tobacco on the edge of a pier, and sometimes wait until morning to light up with a flame conjured between his fingers. Some people saw him that way, smoking a solitary cigarette. A man with a tattered workman's cap, with wet black hair soaking down his back... Shirt and pants decades out of date. Always wet. Pale green skin with strangely long and webbed fingers, tipped with narrow pointed claws. He looked a little odd, really. He held the slender cigarette strangely, between his thumb and his ring finger the claws on his forefinger and middle one were far too awkward, far too long. His toes were almost as long as the fingers were, also webbed and perfectly flexible. A creature of both land and water... But maybe belonging to water a little more. This night, the moon lit up his scales with silver fire along his hands, his nose, his cheekbones, slightly darker where eyebrows would have been on a human face. Did he have the long tangled hair as an imitation of humanity? It had been so long not even his memory would stretch that far. The best he could do was a few centuries at most. A blessing, really. Eternity would make anyone go insane. Something whispered in his mind of murder, of a tied up and weighted form struggling in water, desperately fighting for air, seeking the surface. He stubbed the cigarette out delicately on a metal rivet. He liked to see those deaths, sometimes. He hung his hat on the nail. No doubt, he would be back soon. Without a splash, without a sound, he slid into the water. Into himself? Perhaps. After the End of the World They had left the last town when the harvest was done. It would not have done to overstay their welcome. While any farmer needed a couple of extra hands, these two were drifters, and who knew where they had come from, the things they had done, the things that they were, perhaps. Strange stories often came out of the badlands. So they were on the road again. They travelled together because a traveller alone was asking for trouble. Little else seemed to link them. This close to the badlands, it was not wise to light a fire. But the night was cold, and Alexander worried that having no fire again would be worse. Curling up together at night did not keep them warm enough, and the last time they ate was two days ago. They had been unlucky with supplies handing them over to bandits instead of handing over their lives. At least they had only taken the food and some of Alexander's ammo. It could have been much worse. The boy gathered the firewood automatically, while Alexander did his best to light it. The most they would have was a tea of some bitter herbs, but that was better than nothing. Boiling the water disinfected it, and the herbs covered the taste. Alexander was old enough to remember the time when there were cities, and water could come out of taps. Alexander had been born just before the Cataclysm, before hell came to earth. At fifty-something, he was lucky to have lived so long. When the fire was lit, the boy was making arrows again. Bullets were too rare to waste on hunting - Alexander only used his gun when it was truly necessary. The boy was a fair shot with a bow sufficient for rabbits, and to deter badly equipped raiders. The arrows were simply sharpened and fire hardened sticks. Alexander sometimes wondered who had taught the boy so well, but there was little point in asking. Alexander had never heard him make a sound, not even during the fights they had lost, when the victors slammed him against the wall and, well, better not think about it. He guessed that the boy was probably seventeen or so, maybe eighteen. They were both thin and lean, but the boy would never be a tall man. A lifetime of malnutrition wasn't exactly the best for physical development. Alexander could guess how someone so incompetent at hand to hand combat stayed alive, and it really wasn't his place to judge. The boy had the black hair and the dark skin of a gypsy, and was pretty enough to get by. It wasn't as if Alexander had not taken advantage himself, he was just curious as to why, even in the light of that, the boy still chose to follow him. 'My mother used to say that before the Cataclysm you couldn't see the stars,' Alexander said, staring upwards. People had feared climate change, nuclear war, pandemic, but instead reality had simply cracked . Suddenly day and night was unreliable, the winds led nowhere, roads led to strange imaginary places, the new animals had all the wrong organs and weird shapes. As always, the boy didn't reply, but he took the cup from Alexander and crouched beside him, sipping the bitter brew. At least their camp was sheltered from the wind. 'The first snow is a month away, we need to find somewhere to stay.' It was like talking to a wall, but Alexander was used to it. Having a person was nice. Maybe none of the boy's responses were verbal, but sometimes, like now, the boy leant against him. It was only for warmth, he knew, but he had missed human contact in all the years he had been alone. 'Shall we go to the city?' No reply, of course, except the growling of their stomachs.