#royalreef

I've always envisioned that fishy merfolk (and others who move side-to-side) keep their upper body very very stiff! While their lower body makes large twists and turns, the upper body is relatively still and only makes big sideways movements while steering in tandem with the paired fins. I feel like if the upper body followed along with the serpentine movement (the spine is plenty flexible!), some of the forward-powering thrust would be lost and the merm would end up spending way more energy than necessary to move forward.

Fish TREATS…. numerous FEATS!!

"EWWWWWWW! Miranda, I would never be jealous of Sev for that!!!!"

It's hard to even detect, really. All that manifests are shifting shadows off the distance, the faint rustling of shapes beyond the clinical edge of the interior decoration. It wouldn't even have been something worth considering, worth pondering over, if only it weren't so consistent.

It's trailing Kinger. Or, has been trailing him. Maybe it's been trailing everyone, walking there in the far distance, in the darkness, treading along silently and vanishing back into where it came from the second anyone tries to get a closer look. It's hard to say. Hard to say it isn't just a bug, either, something clipping into the ground or some error of the shader being applied at the edge of the render distance. Hard to say it's anything at all, even if it keeps presenting the deep and unabiding sensation of being watched, being stalked.

Sometimes there's even a pink or blue smear, there in that far distance. It's hard to make anything out, against the glaring lights of the Circus.

But there's more than one reason to keep to the darkness. And more than one person who might seek it out.

There's a presence, in this dark room, a neck-ruffling feeling that occurs in the low, basal parts of the brain, the most basic parts for emulating the human mind. It's clear the second the door shuts, the moment it's just a little too late to rectify the mistake.

It's there. There's no light in this room, no point of clarity. Everything is the deep black of total darkness, the darkness of a cave, the darkness that lies to the brain and the eyes as they try to conjure shapes moving there, to make it make more sense, to illustrate the image of what should be there, even when it's plainly impossible that such information would ever be processed at all.

The shape doesn't need light. She prefers if it's not there, after all. Everything's too glaring here, too bright, hurts her eyes. She's an ambush predator, made for this kind of darkness, gifted other senses to navigate by. It's one of the things she has made sure was continued in this place, to prevent herself from being totally disoriented.

She waits in the silence, for a moment. She's next to the wall opposite where the door's brief illumination was cast, so it didn't catch her, didn't find her crown nor her scales nor her fins, didn't reflect off the tapetum lucidum in her eyes. Her body is low, near to the ground, standing there on all fours, though she didn't think her guest caught that. It might be the most obvious shape to summon from the mind, particularly the human mind, but there's a difference between guesswork and certainty.

The silence stretches so long, so eternal. So heavy, in the air and in time, slowing down to a molasses crawl that sinks into the stomach and threatens to pull everything else down with it.

Eventually, Miranda decides to break that silence.

From the darkness, from the total blackness, emerges a long and low churr. The sound is deep and perfect and musical, even as it itches at something deep within, even as it sounds of something old, primal, something only half-recalled but fully remembered within the structure of the body itself. It pushes outwards in waves, a swift rise and fall like a purr, but too deep to be that noise, too echoing, coming from the chest and not the throat and certainly not the mouth. It is beautiful, and wonderful, and deeply horrific, for no one, absolutely no one, has ever heard a sound like that and lived, not without a pane of glass in the way.

"Who are you?" she asks, hardly any different from the churr, because it doesn't seem as though something like her, like this, should be able to speak. It doesn't help that her voice first calls to mind the animalistic, beautiful and wonderful, and impossible and primordial, all in the same breath.

𝕲𝖍𝖔𝖘𝖙𝖘  𝖜𝖊𝖗𝖊  𝖎𝖒𝖒𝖎𝖓𝖊𝖓𝖙  ,  in  many  ways  it  felt  as  though  the  entire  Big-Top  was  host  to  the  supernatural  just  not  in  the  traditional  sense  .  Perhaps  it  leaned  more  to  the  seraphical  .  Currents  of  floating  eyes  upon  a  bed  of  jagged  edges  down  beneath  the  tiles  .  They  called  them  abstractions  .  Some  NPCs  took  the  form  of  ghosts  they  were  limited  to  linger  only  to  the  space  Caine  oversees  .

Limbless  he  slides  against  the  tiles  much  like  a  mollusc  ,  he  always  got  the  sense  of  being  watched  ,  this  time  was  different  .  It  felt  closer  in  proximity  .  His  eyes  flicker  from  one  point  to  another  ,  curving  his  form  back  to  try  &&  catch  culprit  ,  he  can't  find  them  .  For  the  moment  he  surmises  it  was  just  his  shadow  .

As  soon  as  he  slips  into  the  darkness  backstage  behind  the  grand  ,  red  velveteen  curtains  .

Now  this  space  was  indisputably  occupied  by  another  presence  ,  he  felt  it  as  eyes  adjust  to  the  serene  macabre  .  The  low  drone  of  something  makes  itself  known  .  His  hands  clench  &&  release  in  anticipation  .  Refraining  from  holding  his  breath  &&  emitting  light  .  His  clearer  mind  reasons  he  should  avoid  it  .  If  there  was  an  abstraction  in  here  [  God  forbid  it  ,  he  didn't  want  to  lose  another  ,  not  again  ]  it  would  become  agitated  by  the  glow  .

A  voice  soon  breathes  through  the  space  .  No  .  Not  an  abstraction  lest  on  could  learn  to  vocally  express  again  ...  anyone  who  abstracted  here  would  have  recognized  him.

⸺ ♔.   ❝   Kinger  .  At  least  that's  the  name  I  chose  upon  entry  .    ❞   Pause  .  He  listens  .  ❝   What's  your  name  @royalreef ?    ❞  ⸺   ཐིཋྀ   ₊

She pokes him with the very end of her nose, about as gently as a giant marine predator can. Sniffsniffsniff. Thankfully, she has enough experience with crustaceans of all stripes to know not to flick her tongue at him to do so.

Kril lets out the most high pitched, yet tiniest little squeak as soon as he was met with a snout the size of his whole body, both claws going up in a mix of a defensive stance... or as to admit prehentive defeat. She might've met plenty of hermit crabs in her long life, but he couldn't say the same about... whatever this lady could be!

And. For once? He'd argue that his lonely life as an actual hermit didn't have anything to do with his ignorance!

"..uhm...?"

This said... not being eaten, ripped apart or thrown around right away helps not panicking completely. Granted she could change her mind and decide he's a worthy snack any moment, wouldn't be the first time he gets into a situation like this, but for now she seems... alright??

The whirlpool of thoughts while on her own always led her to new possibilities regarding the circus, subconsciously digging her gloves into the sand for some semblance of grounding; what could she do to overcome the innate, rational fear? Dive headfirst with no consequence? It was hard to steady her heart drumming in her chest to ease up at the sheer thought. Bodies of water that she had ample control over? No problem, most of the time.

However, when this was a deep sea exploration and the jester, though donned in the proper attire, she could barely muster the will to take the leap and get it over with, even with the consensus of cartoon physics here. Her breath was shakier than she anticipated, glancing over at who had accompanied her for this voyage.

⸺ ❝ I ... I don't know about this. Maybe - maybe it's not too late to back out and talk some sense and reason into Caine to call off this adventure .. you think? ❞ A nervous smile that reflected in her posture as she sat; she probably looked a little silly completely fitted with a wet suit, scuba mask, oxygen tank and flippers to really sell the whole look together. Even with all of this in mind and at her resources to use willingly for this deep sea venture for some "lost treasure", she wasn't too confident about this.