08-14-2020, 02:52 PM
<center><img src="https://i.postimg.cc/tJm4qrjM/anomalyjelly.png"><table bgcolor=1F1F1F style="border-color: black; border-width: 0px; border-style: solid; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-top: -195px" cellspacing=30 cellpadding=30 width=600><tr><td><CENTER><font face=times new roman color=5c736a><font style=font-size:9pt;line-height:12pt;letter-spacing:1px><font style=letter-spacing:3px><p align=right><Font color=02a375><i>a n o m a l y.</i></font></font> </CENTER><p align=justify>
She’s not sure what she expected death to be like. She’d thought about it enough. But this? This was nothing like she’d imagined. She’d always imagined something more peaceful. Quiet even. She knew immediately she was naïve to think so, like so many other things in her short life.
The fog looks like that she had known in life. Such was common in Pangea – given the climate of the unforgiving land. But she knew better than to think that this task would be simple. That this fog would be <i>normal</i>. She can hear the buzzing when he mentions it – faint, like the humming of an insect’s wings. Her glowing gaze doesn’t deviate from the undulating mass of fog – doesn’t look over to the others who had been brought to the afterlife. It was hypnotic, almost, watching as the earthbound clouds moved lazily across this strange version of the beach…
<i>Good luck,</i> he says, but Anomaly does not feel very lucky. That doesn’t stop her, though. She’d been given this task. She’d see it through. Determination was something she’d inherited from her mother. Stubbornness too. Or perhaps that had come from him? Her father? Or perhaps there were latent bits of him dormant within her broken body yet to emerge. Or maybe they were just hidden away in the fog?
The fog is cool against her skin when she reaches the edge. A strange sensation, but not an unwelcome one. She can’t see anything, so all she can do is follow the sound. She does her best to follow the buzzing – to try to orient herself in the direction it sounds like its coming from. She’s not sure how long she walks before she hears something.
<i>Someone.</i>
<b>”Hello?”</b> she says, her voice immediately evaporating into the void. Perhaps it was just one of the others. But her gut told her that this was something else. Shapes begin to form in the mist. Equine shapes. Ghostly, corporeal shapes with faces she doesn’t recognize. She turns away from them – her first instinct has always been flight. But as she puts distance between herself and the figures, the reappear in front of her. She slides to a halt. <b>”Go away!”</b> she spits, knowing that she sounds like a petulant child. They are undeterred. They step closer as she steps back. She flattens her ears against her skull. <b>”Let me pass!”</b> But with each moment the shapes become more and more solid. More lifelike.
She’s surrounded now, and can feel the panic rising in her chest. She grinds her teeth as she considers her options. She’s not a fighter but she knows she has a means to hurt them. She’d never used her ability intentionally. She knew, theoretically, that she could but it had never crossed her mind to do so.
Until now.
So she charges, reaching out to touch the creatures knowing that the radioactivity would do its lethal work. She brushes her muzzle against the closest figure and the fog-equine screams out in agony, but as she touches the creature, fire erupts on her own skin in the very place she had made contact. She looks at her shoulder to see an ugly lesion appearing. Something strange was happening. She again turned to another of the fog-equines blocking her path, this time running her muzzle across its flank and sure enough searing pain erupted in her own. Her ability was backfiring. Each time she used it, she too paid the price.
The buzzing was growing louder now, and she knew she was heading the right direction, but as far as she could see there was a wall of foggy bodies blocking her path.
She knew she couldn’t stay in here. She had to push through.
So that’s exactly what she did. She lurched forward – physically pushing the fog-equines out of the way. The pain stole her breath at first. Glowing green blood again began to drip from her nostrils. Eventually she began to scream – she’s not sure whether from the agony or the anguish but eventually she became numb to the pain.
Had it simply overwhelmed her or had it stopped? She couldn’t be sure, but surely it had to have stopped or she would have been overwhelmed by now. Ultimately, all that she could concentrate on was the sound of the buzzing. It sounded as if it was coming from inside her head, and maybe it was. She was beyond the point of knowing at that point.
She stopped only when she reached the edge of the cliff, numb and overwhelmed, and though briefly about throwing herself over the edge before she realized…
She was already dead. What good could that possibly do her now. Instead, she lowered her nose to her foreleg and wiped the now-drying blood from her nose.
<br><br><font style=font-size:9pt;line-height:12pt;letter-spacing:1px><font style=letter-spacing:3px><Font color=02a375><i> i'm breathing in the chemicals.</i></font></font></table> </center></center>
She’s not sure what she expected death to be like. She’d thought about it enough. But this? This was nothing like she’d imagined. She’d always imagined something more peaceful. Quiet even. She knew immediately she was naïve to think so, like so many other things in her short life.
The fog looks like that she had known in life. Such was common in Pangea – given the climate of the unforgiving land. But she knew better than to think that this task would be simple. That this fog would be <i>normal</i>. She can hear the buzzing when he mentions it – faint, like the humming of an insect’s wings. Her glowing gaze doesn’t deviate from the undulating mass of fog – doesn’t look over to the others who had been brought to the afterlife. It was hypnotic, almost, watching as the earthbound clouds moved lazily across this strange version of the beach…
<i>Good luck,</i> he says, but Anomaly does not feel very lucky. That doesn’t stop her, though. She’d been given this task. She’d see it through. Determination was something she’d inherited from her mother. Stubbornness too. Or perhaps that had come from him? Her father? Or perhaps there were latent bits of him dormant within her broken body yet to emerge. Or maybe they were just hidden away in the fog?
The fog is cool against her skin when she reaches the edge. A strange sensation, but not an unwelcome one. She can’t see anything, so all she can do is follow the sound. She does her best to follow the buzzing – to try to orient herself in the direction it sounds like its coming from. She’s not sure how long she walks before she hears something.
<i>Someone.</i>
<b>”Hello?”</b> she says, her voice immediately evaporating into the void. Perhaps it was just one of the others. But her gut told her that this was something else. Shapes begin to form in the mist. Equine shapes. Ghostly, corporeal shapes with faces she doesn’t recognize. She turns away from them – her first instinct has always been flight. But as she puts distance between herself and the figures, the reappear in front of her. She slides to a halt. <b>”Go away!”</b> she spits, knowing that she sounds like a petulant child. They are undeterred. They step closer as she steps back. She flattens her ears against her skull. <b>”Let me pass!”</b> But with each moment the shapes become more and more solid. More lifelike.
She’s surrounded now, and can feel the panic rising in her chest. She grinds her teeth as she considers her options. She’s not a fighter but she knows she has a means to hurt them. She’d never used her ability intentionally. She knew, theoretically, that she could but it had never crossed her mind to do so.
Until now.
So she charges, reaching out to touch the creatures knowing that the radioactivity would do its lethal work. She brushes her muzzle against the closest figure and the fog-equine screams out in agony, but as she touches the creature, fire erupts on her own skin in the very place she had made contact. She looks at her shoulder to see an ugly lesion appearing. Something strange was happening. She again turned to another of the fog-equines blocking her path, this time running her muzzle across its flank and sure enough searing pain erupted in her own. Her ability was backfiring. Each time she used it, she too paid the price.
The buzzing was growing louder now, and she knew she was heading the right direction, but as far as she could see there was a wall of foggy bodies blocking her path.
She knew she couldn’t stay in here. She had to push through.
So that’s exactly what she did. She lurched forward – physically pushing the fog-equines out of the way. The pain stole her breath at first. Glowing green blood again began to drip from her nostrils. Eventually she began to scream – she’s not sure whether from the agony or the anguish but eventually she became numb to the pain.
Had it simply overwhelmed her or had it stopped? She couldn’t be sure, but surely it had to have stopped or she would have been overwhelmed by now. Ultimately, all that she could concentrate on was the sound of the buzzing. It sounded as if it was coming from inside her head, and maybe it was. She was beyond the point of knowing at that point.
She stopped only when she reached the edge of the cliff, numb and overwhelmed, and though briefly about throwing herself over the edge before she realized…
She was already dead. What good could that possibly do her now. Instead, she lowered her nose to her foreleg and wiped the now-drying blood from her nose.
<br><br><font style=font-size:9pt;line-height:12pt;letter-spacing:1px><font style=letter-spacing:3px><Font color=02a375><i> i'm breathing in the chemicals.</i></font></font></table> </center></center>
Anomaly is radioactive.
Those that touch her may experience metallic taste, nosebleed, nausea, headache, hair loss and/or skin lesions.
Symptoms become worse with prolonged exposure and onset is accelerated when exposed to her blood.