The Things That Stir In The Night [1x1]

Isabella carefully eyed the shivering tail, trying to suppress the shiver that threatened to roll down her spine. Tia creeped her out normally, but the glint in her eyes—excitement—was enough to nearly push her over the edge. But Isabella really couldn't say anything; she was just as excited to finally get something good to eat.

She nodded slightly at Tia, then moved towards the main street. Coming out of the alley, she found herself standing between two stores, both closed. Looking around, she saw that every store was shut just the same. Brow furrowed, she ducked back into the alleyway, just out enough that she could see who was coming. To the right, the street turned, meaning that you couldn't see whatever celebration was going on over in that direction.

The street was deserted. Well, mostly deserted. A little ways down, a plump, auburn–haired man locked up a shop. He tucked the keys into a pocket in his jacket, checked his long, curly hair in the shop window, then started walking down in the way of the festivities, towards Isabella.

She ducked fully into the alley, holding her breath. She'd wait until she could hear footsteps. She'd wait, she'd wait...

Oh, screw it. She was too hungry.

"Help!" she called, just loud enough so that it wouldn't be heard out of the street. Once more for good measure. "Help!"

Then, she turned tail and ran into the alley system. She kept her pace slow at first, until she could hear the man running behind her, shouting back, "hey! Wait!" Then she sped up, careful not to run into any dead ends, and just waiting for Tia to come out of nowhere and clean it all up.
 
Tia looked around as she walked down the alleyway. So dark and cold. Somehow damp from the cooler atmosphere the air beginning to warm up. She hoped that Isabella would hurry with the victim..... Prey.... Person. Tia sighed as she sat down on the cold ground. She thinks of people as victims?

Her thoughts were shaken when she heard a female voice say 'help'. Isabella. Her plan must be in motion. She hurried and jumped behind a garbage dumpster, waiting for her mark to be seen. After a minute or so, she saw a shadow moving around. Then she saw Isabella. She moved a paw to approach her, but she soon reminded herself of the person following her.

Sure enough, a man's voice echoed around the walls. She lowered her body to mesh into whatever darkness she had to work with.

"Hey! Hello? Where are you? Come back!" The man called out. He ran a little longer until he met a forked pathway. He sighed, looking around and seeing himself a bit lost.

"Hello?"

He soon heard a rattling sound seconds later. He gasped, wondering what he was hearing. Supposedly a snake? A rattlesnake. He backed away a little, wanting to go the way he came, but before he could go anywhere, the dumpster rolled and blocked his way. He gasped and backed away, falling on his bottom in shock. Tia hissed at the man trying to get away, making him freeze in fear.

She flicked her tongue as she eyed the man, wondering how to kill him without a mess. Then she got it. Some snakes killed via constriction. So that's what she'll do. Padding up to the man with a soft hiss, Tia shushed the man as she raised her tail high in the air. She walled over him, pinned him down with her paws, then wrapped her tail around his neck. He choked, trying to yell and fight his way free, but Tia was too heavy.

Within minutes, the man was dead. Tia hissed softly, suppressing the urges to do more that spun in her head.

"Isabella? You can come out from wherever you are," Tia called out.
 
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Isabella kept up her pace as she weaved through the streets, doing her best not to run into any dead–ends. She never saw the man when she looked over her shoulder, only sometimes seeing his shadow just around the bend. She started to peer into the different dead streets she passed, hoping that Tia had made herself obvious enough. She hadn't, but after spotting a shadow that was maybe just a little too big to be a dog, she decided that she'd gone far enough. She went around a few more bends, before dipping and crouching behind a dumpster.

She shut her eyes, hoping it would make her ears keener. She listened intently, stomach growling, desperate to hear the sounds of the kill...

She heard a few strangled, struggling sounds. It went on for so long, it was almost unbearable; couldn't Tia just hurry up? Finally, it fell quiet. Isabella was already on her feet when Tia called out to her, and she rushed back to the scene, mouth already watering.

She beamed at the sight of the man, just giving a bare nod to Tia before kneeling beside his body and starting her feast. She tore the meat from his arms, stuffing it into her mouth without care. It was only when most of his left arm was entirely stripped that she sat back, panting, blood smeared around her mouth. She wiped herself with the back of her sleeve, only ending up wiping it around her cheeks. She looked up at Tia, teeth covered in red.

"Nice one," she said breathlessly. "You did it better than I could." The satisfaction of a full stomach was making her nicer. She took her bag from her back, opened it up and pulled out a large tupperware box. She started tearing more meat from the body, packing it tightly into the container. "Is there any sort of ice near the cave?" she asked.
 
Sitting a few feet away from the body, Tia craned her neck back with an uncomfortable look in her eyes. Another person killed by her paws. But this time, she did it for another person. But that didn't make it any better. This person could've had a girlfriend, or a wife and children. A family. And she just.... choked the life out of him. Squeezed it out, like a kid would to a bottle of glue.

Isabella finally came up to her kill and began to eat. Tia's head ducked a little behind her tail as the sounds of ripping flesh entered her ears. How she hated that sound. But her demon loved it, she could feel it.

Isabella seemed to be better already. She supposed that human flesh was necessary for Isabella to live. Still..... She couldn't keep doing this. If she did..... She didn't know what would happen to her. Urges would begin to develop, and they wouldn't be anything innocent or acceptable for Isabella's eyes to see. She knew what she was capable of - especially when she was in this form.

Her thoughts paused when she heard Isabella talk to her. Tia's serpentine head tilted to the side. She..... complemented her? "Th-thanks," Tia softly said. Her tail flicked and wagged a little before she even realized it. But she then stopped it. She shouldn't be happy when someone compliments her for how she killed a person.

Her head then craned back again when asked about ice. A weird question. "No, there isn't. But..... It gets cooler in my cave. All the way back. It's why I have my blankets," Tia nervously said. She backed away a little and rubbed her neck with a paw. "But I'm not sure if it's cool enough for your liking. M-maybe we could find some s-store and steal some ice...." Tia stuttered.
 
Isabella licked her lips as she packed away the meat, trying to figure out how long it would last her. She didn't usually like to budget her food, but she didn't have much of an option this time; the man's body would be found, and everyone would be a lot more cautious, about pretty much everything, and it would be ten times more difficult to get a good hunt. She thought back to a few years ago, when, after a hunt gone wrong, she'd had to survive off an arm's length of meat for a month while she hid from police. She'd managed it, by eating about nine bits of animal meat for every bit of human meat. It was the worst thing that had ever happened to her, but she had managed it. And she had a lot more than an arm's length here.

Shoving the last of the meat down, she squeezed the lid onto the container and stuffed it back into her bag, zipping it up snugly. Standing up, she gave the man's body a once–over. It was a shame that she couldn't get any more off him. She turned back to Tia. "It won't be cool enough," she said, nose wrinkling as she thought. "Ice would be good. And a cooler." She shifted her weight on her feet. "But we'll have to be quick. We've got three hours, tops."

She turned to Tia, eyes alight, smiling. "Everywhere's shut. It'll be easy enough to break in, especially since you can probably kick the doors down or something." She glanced at her body, the blood splotches and splatters nearly covering her head to foot. "What stores have back entrances?" she asked, clearly realising that a blood–covered child would be a cause for concern for more people.
 
A sigh hissed out Tia's mouth as she thought about the situation presented to her. So she needed ice to store Isabella's.... food. Great. More weight to carry on her back. Her mind scoured the neighborhood that sat in her memory, but she couldn't tell where everything was in perspective anymore. She looked up to the sky, where the rooftops were again. Perhaps if she could get up there again.....

No. Too much work. She might have a better chance if she just.... no! Going out in the open was suicidal. Could she afford to bust down doors in hopes that she'd get the right one? And where would Isabella hide? She couldn't just linger here - there was always a chance to be caught, even during an event.

Tia groaned. "I have no idea. I told you that I haven't been here in town for a while. And besides, I'm behind these buildings. I can't have a layout if I can't figure out where we are," Tia said as she paced back and forth. But then she thought of something. Tia and Isabella were only a block or so away from where the alleyways ended, led to a small strip of blacktop, and gave way to the forest. If she could remember, there was a small hunting goods shop and a mini mart next to it. Surely the mini mart would have ice and a cooler.

She couldn't be one hundred percent sure, but the confidence was high nonetheless. She hopped past the girl and dashed towards the way they had came. She pushed the dumpster back into place, panting a little as she turned to Isabella.

"There's a mini mart around the corner, back the way we came. I could go by myself while you hide the body, or we can go together. If you're coming, we have to be quick, so try and keep up," Tia said as she began bouncing around. She was eager to move and run about, using her speed to move the process along. When she saw Isabella to be ready, she took off, her legs carrying Tia hundreds of feet in seconds.

Tia skidded to a stop when she smelled the scent of stainless steel. That and the peculiar scent of deer. The hunting store. Which meant that the mini mart was next door. And sure enough, Tia caught the scent of food. Perfect. Maybe she could snatch some stuff while she was at it.

Tia snuck up to the door that she was sure belonged to the mart. She turned around so her tail and feet her facing the door, then proceeded to smash on it. Her clubbed rattle smacked the knob of the door, while her feet actually beat upon the door itself. She did this back and forth until either the doorknob broke off, or the body of the door broke through. But then Tia saw the doorknob beginning to give in. So she turned around and used her front paws to snatch the remaining resistance, the metal mechanism flying across the alleyway.

She looked back and forth to make sure the coast was clear before opening the door and going inside.
 
Isabella clicked the lid onto the tupperware and shoved it back into her bag as she stood up. She frowned a little, and pointed up at the roofs that they'd been up on just a few minutes ago. "If you need a better view, just go up there again," she offered, but halfway through her sentence Tia started to speak over her. Out of spite, she kept speaking, but realised that Tia clearly hadn't been listening to what she said. Thankfully she stopped speaking in time to hear what Tia was telling her, but she only caught on when Tia was practically flying down the street.

Isabella huffed, and started at a sprint, doing her best to keep up. Even if she hadn't been the size of a six–year old, there was no way that she would have been able to keep up. She at least managed to keep an eye on where Tia went so that she didn't get lost, but by the time she got to the shop, Tia had already made her way inside.

Breathing heavily, she scrambled through the door and into the shop. "Good thing there's no alarm," she panted, knowing full well that she shouldn't speak too soon. She looked up at the signs hanging from the ceiling that named the aisles; '1: Cleaning Supplies'; '2: Personal Grooming'; '3: Pet Food'...

She started walking down the main aisle, until she saw the sign '14: Camping Supplies'. Nodding to herself, she started to scan for an icebox that would do. Near the end of the aisle, she spotted the coolers, stacked neatly into one narrow shelf. She picked one off the shelf; a small, pale grey one, which was big enough for the tupperware box and a bit of ice. Holding it by the fabric handle, she jogged back down the aisle.

"Hey!" she stage–whispered. "Got a cooler! You got the ice?"
 
Tia padded through the sales floor silently, like predator would. Her eyes constantly scanned through the isles, briefly seeing what each isle had to offer before she saw some guns behind a glass box. She stared at the weapons, hissing softly to herself in nervousness. She had never felt comfortable in the presence of guns - with knives at least she could keep an eye on the blade. Granted, knives were dangerous in their own right, so she didn't feel very much safer around them either, especially when yielded by someone who specialises in knife combat.

But guns? They just made Tia nervous. The bigger the gun, the more nervous she got. And of course on the front desk, there were a lot more where that came from. She recalled being shot at a while back, by a deer hunter. They had thought that she was a wild animal scavenging for the dead deer they had. A shiver crept through her as she recalled the sound of the bullet as it flew past her ears and hitting a tree behind her. Or the feeling of the bullet grazing the very surface of her fur as she ran away. She thought for sure she was shot, but she really wasn't. The feeling was too real for her, and she didn't want to feel what a bullet would truly feel like being inside her body.

She shook her head with a snort, and kept going down the way. She soon saw a blue glow at the side of the store, and went up to the refrigerator that held frozen items. And ice was one of them. With a claw, Tia pulled the door open and pawed a bag off the pile, letting it hit the floor with an icy thud. She grabbed the plastic with her claws, but decided to use her tail to grab it. Lifting it up, she placed the ice bag on her back to prevent it from slipping. The cold made her shiver, but she'd have to deal with it for a moment.

Just then, she heard Isabella call out to her. Her head lifted up and she flicked her tongue out, wondering where she was.

"Yeah! I just got it. I'm going to go out," Tia whispered. She padded back to the back door, and hurriedly went back outside. She checked to see if the coast was clear, and when she didn't see anybody, she quickly bounced to the shadows of the alleyways. She hid around the corner, setting the bag down for a spell. Despite the fur on her back, Tia still disliked the colder temperature settling on her spine.
 
Isabella listened carefully for Tia's reply, stopping in her tracks. Calling back a quiet "alright!", she went back towards the way they'd came in, the cooler bouncing against her leg as she went. As she did, she passed the gun display, and paused. One of them would be useful, if Ms Baccay came back.

She glanced down at the cooler. They'd already started stealing... Was there much more harm in taking one more thing?

She took a step towards the weapons, then thought better of it. She didn't even know how to fire a gun, and that was probably the easiest thing. And anyway, Tia was probably a lot deadlier than one of them. She turned back to the door and jogged outside.

She didn't see Tia at first when she first left the building, but she heard the crunch as the bags of ice hit the floor. She wrapped around the corner and gave Tia a nod. "Thanks," she said, kneeling down to move the tupperware container and the ice into the cooler. "We were quick. There's no chance anyone saw us."

She stood up straight, shifting the weight of the cooler between her hands. It was heavy, but not too heavy—she'd manage. She looked around for something familiar, but since she'd only taken the time to learn the alleyways, she was counting on her luck. Thankfully, she spotted a shop–front that she recognised. "This way," she said, and, knowing that the forest was only a little ways behind the shop, she jogged the short distance down the street and weaved into the street behind it. It lead to the forest in less than a minute, and she looked behind her to check that Tia was following.
 
Wuth the ice off her back, Tia was happy that the chill would finally go away. She sat down as she waited for Isabella to fill her cooler up with the ice, and stood up on her feet when she was done. Finally, they could probably get back to the forest, where she felt safest. Tia felt shame in the fact the wilderness was where she felt solace instead of civilization like the rest of the townspeople, but her life had taken a horrible turn, and she had no choice in the matter.

She shook her head as she left the store, and followed Isabella to wherever she was heading. She didn't complain, for she had rarely used the alleyways for anything besides to hide for a moment, so Isabella had the right of way.

She paused for a second when she realized that she was to cross the street. Out in the open daylight..... It made her extremely nervous. But she had to move, or else risk being seen. Cheers and laughter made Tia hiss softly, and she backed up a little to take a running leap. She bunched her muscles, ran as fast as she could, and the jumped the distance before hiding in the shadows again. She panted heavily with nervous energy, shaking the shivers that crept all over her body.

She followed Isabella quietly the rest of the way to the forest, where they both retreated from the town after a rather successful hunt.

~~~~~​

The days that followed were strange and full of surprises. Tia was sure that Isabella would leave her to escape the town of Blue Creek Valley once she had her fill of human meat. She figured it was only a matter of time before she did left, so she had kept herself at a distance to prevent from growing more attached to the girl than she already was. No need to provoke any sort of meltdown from the inevitable.

But even so, Tia felt herself wanting to be a better person to Isabella. If she was to never see this girl again, she wished for herself to be in a good light. So, Tia tried to be friendly. It was hard, putting up the anti-social persona all the time, but she tried. Maybe, just maybe, she could show who she really was, so long as the demon hadn't completely destroyed her entire image.
She invited Isabella to join her for a swim at the lake that she always went to. She invited Isabella sunbathe with her when the sun was high, in the middle of the field she had told her about days before. She even told Isabella some stories about herself when she wasn't a murdering, shapeshifting demon monster. About the games played with her clumsy father, and the delicious food she ate that her mother cooked during summer break, or any other day.

She kept hunting for animals that would sustain her and Isabella should she want any. She hoped that Isabella's hunger for humans would be satiated with animal meat, at least for a moment. But she would hope in vain, for soon the saved meat that Isabella had went away, and she grew hungry again.
It frustrated Tia, but she couldn't blame the girl for wanting to eat what would truly sustain her. It wasn't her fault. So, when she was asked, Tia went to town and hunted with her. But something strange kept happening.... with each hunt, Tia felt herself in this.... headspace. The demon kept fed her those urges to hunt and maim something, and it grew stronger and stronger with each hunt. It even showed when she was back home, hunting the animals that she used to kill with as much mercy as possible. One day, she chased a deer, and clawed its hide to wound it. Instead of going for the throat and ending its life like she normally did, she prolonged the kill, poking it with her tail and taunting it, knowing it was slowly dying from blood loss. She laughed as it bellowed in fear and pain, and after a good while, she finally killed it, but by ramming its head into the tree trunk multiple times. Her hissing laughs echoed in the air before she realized what happened.

Fearful of what was happening to her, Tia decided to not go hunting with Isabella the next time she wanted to go.

And sure enough, after two days, Isabella had the pull of her hunger again.

"I'm not going," Tia said as she walked into her cave. She sat down while she faced Isabella, her stature forever boasting how much larger she was compared to the other female.

"I can't go. I.... I just can't. You've hunted on your own before - you go and do it. Use your powers of persuasion to lure someone in, and make them kill themselves or something. I don't care what you do, just don't ask me to come along," Tia said with a sigh. She laid down on the cold cave rock, and curled up in a ball.
 
The last week of April rolled in, and the spring turned warm. Isabella's thicker clothes weren't suited to the weather, but her regular way of finding new ones—digging through bins—didn't work in Blue Creek Valley, especially not as more and more people started turning up dead. She and Tia could only go into town for a few minutes to hunt, and even then it got more and more difficult to do. People didn't want to go places alone, and often moved in twos or threes or even fours. They had to try a load of different tactics to separate people apart, and the meat needed to stretch more and more as people stopped following voices into alleyways, and stopped trusting little girls.

Despite this, Isabella felt the need to leave the cave fade away. In the days after that first hunt, she was planning to say goodbye to Tia and head out, she really was. She even packed her things up once or twice. But as soon as it came to the moment of truth, she never did it. She told herself that it was because Tia was a good hunter, but she knew that explanation wasn't quite true.

She really noticed the change when Tia started becoming kinder, too. The first time she offered to swim with her, the answer was a resounding no. But the next time, she went and sat at the edge of the lake, kicking her bare feet in the water, and watching Tia paddle around. She never fully went in, though. She didn't have much problem with sunbathing, but she always kept her distance. It was when Tia started to share her stories that Isabella got more comfortable. She was just sad that she didn't have any stories to give her in return.

One strange, cold night, Isabella slept with Tia's blanket wrapped around her, and the bone on the other side of the cave.

When she woke up that day, she opened the cooler and peered inside, knowing that it would be empty. She'd finished the meat a few days ago. The ache of hunger was starting to pull at her again, and she knew that she was getting to the point where she'd get weak if she went much longer. But when she told Tia this, she was snubbed.

She scoffed. "Seriously? You've seen what it's like now. How am I meant to separate people, and pick one off at the same time?" She put her hands on her hips, standing over Tia, scowling.
 
Tia was quiet for a moment at Isabella's question. It was a valid question. Once the community caught on to the string of murders happening in town, hunting got a million times harder. Nobody was foolish or stupid enough to go into a dark alleyway alone anymore - even the homeless found shelters to sleep in instead of being in the alleyways. There was a chance that some stayed in abandoned buildings, but she after hunting Isabella's way for a number of times, she'd somewhat forgotten about them. Perhaps she could try the buildings once again, in the dead of night when most are in their own homes, and the risk of being seen is at its lowest.

Tia lifted her serpentine head from under the tail and looked to Isabella. Her head tilted while she gave a hissing sigh. "Look, I know how hard it's been lately. I have to deal with it too. But I just can't hunt with you this time. You wouldn't understand. Next time I might be better enough to deal with it, but not this time. If you could wait until nightfall, then maybe your selections would be a little easier. Hunt in the abandoned buildings this time, instead of the alleyways. It may not sound ideal, but with everything happening in the alleyways, one would think being inside would be much smarter. Hell, I'd think that way. I would totally do that if I was in the same situation," Tia said with a shrug of her shoulder.

She sighed as she studied the smaller female in front of her. She could see her eagerness to go hunt again, and felt bad to be the one to stop all possible plans. She hated killing humans - at least she wanted to hate it. But lately, the hate had slowly dissipated, thanks to the demon's constant pestering and sinister influence. If she wanted it to go away, she had to sit the hunt out, and then sit all other hunts for the next several days. She's have to eat from the most recent deer carcass from then on, but she had no choice. Just to rest her brain.... and by resting that most likely meant fighting that wretched demon in her mind. Hopefully she'd be better off.

"You have options. Wait until nightfall, or wait for me to be able to hunt again. Or, just go off to the town and try your best to find someone. Your choice," Tia said with a sigh. She laid back down and curled up in a ball, trying to drown out the presence of the demon in her head.
 
Isabella huffed. "I don't even know what buildings you're talking about," she lied. She crossed her arms over her chest and fixed Tia with a glare. "I only know the alleys. Which is why I can only hunt there. And I can't do it just myself anymore." Last time she'd done a hunt on her own, she wasn't even in Blue Creek Valley. Her prey there had been really trusting, and really eager to help out, no matter what. It had been easy. Blue Creek Valley was on serious high alert, and getting a good hunt would be impossible if she was alone.

She ground her teeth together. "Why are you being all mysterious?" she snapped, feeling her face start to grow hot. "Just tell me why you can't do it. Don't assume that I 'won't get it', or whatever you're trying to pull." She put air–quotations around 'won't get it'. She took a breath to keep ranting, but stopped herself. She held the breath for a moment, then slowly let it out.

She paused, then asked, "how long until you can hunt again?"
 
Tia gave a soft hiss when Isabella said that she didn't know which buildings she was talking about. If she had eyelids, she would've narrowed them with suspicion. There were a handful of abandoned buildings in that medium town, and she was sure she talked about at least one of them. The other ones can't be that hard to find, even if one was new to the town. It's impossible to mistake an abandoned building for one that was habitable and used. Tia once again lifted her tail away from her face to give her a look, but this one was one of growing irritation and concern.

But the snapping wasn't going to do Isabella or Tia any good. Especially Isabella. She felt the demon hissing in her head, and rose on her paws as she hissed back.

"But you won't! You aren't going through the same crap as I am! And if you were, you're hiding it pretty damn well." Tia snapped back. She was ready to argue with Isabella, but her acquaintance quickly stopped to give a deep breath -- Tia took the time to do so as well. No snapping off, not unless she wanted to rip her throat out.

A question floated in the air, and Tia flicked her tongue as she thought of her answer. She sighed after a moment - Isabella wasn't going to like the answer.

"I give myself at least a week before I feel confident to go back out. I have food that I can pick from, so I have no worries." Tia said with a short hiss. She knew the look in Isabella's face would be that of irritation and desperation, so she shook her head as she sat up.

"Don't get mad at me! I gave you multiple options to choose from, and waiting on me is the worst one. The time length is for your and everyone else's safety! In the state that I'm in, I'd be no good to you. I can guarantee that you won't have a clean and efficient kill.... I'm a liability rather than an asset. I just can't be your partner in crime this time," Tia sadly said.

Just then, she felt the demon inject its sadistic attitude in her head. The desire to hunt.... to sink her fangs into a body.... to kill someone with no remorse... It was beginning to slowly build up again. Her eyes let up an eerie glow as saliva seeped out of her maw again, and Tia groaned as she backed away into the darker part of her cave. Her eyes trained onto Isabella as her tail rattled softly, claws clicking on the rock in a slow and taunting manner.

"A choice is given to you. If you wait until night, your chances will increase, even if a little. If you go on your own, but hunt somewhere else, your chances will also increase. But if I go with you now, you're guarantee a kill.... but you'll certainly regret it. But I'll surely enjoy it. It has been a while since I've sank my fangs into somebody... You'll have food though. But something tells me...." Tia paused for a haunting effect, and the sound of her claws clicking on the ground slowly got closer and closer to Isabella. Her body stopped at the fringes of the darker part of the cave and the slightly brighter part of the cave.

"...that you wanna go at it alone. Unless you reaaally want me to go. Do you?" Tia asked in that raspy hissing voice that would send shivers down Tia's own spine.
 
Tia's retaliation made it even more difficult for Isabella to hold her tongue, but she managed it. She was being so condescending about it, for no reason. If Isabella could wrap her head around her own existence—a mind–controlling, cannibalistic, forever–child—then she'd definitely get whatever was going on with Tia. She was tempted to bring that up, but she'd already decided that she was going to be the bigger person, no matter how much her irritated, empty stomach nagged. But whatever was going on in Tia's head, she was really getting her back up about it.

Isabella audibly groaned at Tia's answer, pressing the balls of her hands into her eyes. "No worries? No worries?" she spluttered. "No worries for you!" She dropped her hands and fixed her dark eyes on Tia's, look almost pleading. "I won't survive that long Tia, I won't."

The more Tia spoke, the more she made stupid excuses, the more Isabella's anger grew. She talked about 'the state she was in', how she'd be a 'liability'—it was all a load of bullcrap. With how vague she was being, Isabella was becoming pretty sure that she was just being lazy; she just couldn't be bothered hunting today, and she didn't care about how dangerous it was for Isabella. Her resentment was clear on her face, her jaw tightly clenched.

Then, the air changed. After nearly a month with her, Isabella could tell when a change was coming on, could practically feel it looming. Her hand immediately went to the space under her arm, where she usually pinned the bone against her body, and her fingers found dead air. She hadn't slept with it, and she hadn't picked it up once she'd woken. It currently sat near the mouth of the cave; it might as well have been miles away.

She kept a brave face as Tia approached her, knowing—or more so hoping—that she wouldn't hurt her. She heard the words she said, but didn't quite listen. Tia spoke a lot, but didn't actually say much. Half the time, the stuff she said was just padding to make her more scary. The worst part was that it worked. Though she didn't break eye contact, Isabella found herself taking a few precautionary steps backwards, towards the cave's exit.

She stopped when she felt her foot brush against the bone, and without looking away, she crouched down and grabbed it, tucking it under her arm where it belonged. She suppressed a shiver at Tia's words, and set her face in a glower. "Don't come looking for me if I don't come back," she snarled.

She turned and left the cave, walking towards town.
 
Tia - in her semi-controlled state - watched as Isabella walked away from her. At first, she hissed softly with disinterest, but after a while, the demon stopped feeding her those urges, and her normal self was able to come forth.

And she didn't like what had happened.

With a gasp she realized how her conversation went. That was not how she wanted it to go! What did she just do?! Emotions began to swirl in her head as the laughter of the demon echoed through her mind.

No.... no, no, no!

Tia panted as she paced around the cave, until she clawed the cave walls with a desparate roar.
"God damnit! What did you do?! I wanted her to go by herself, but not like that! She's going to leave me now! We've been together for about a month, and this one thing is just gonna drive her away! I wanted her as a friend! We were so close, and you ruined it!" Tia snarled.

'Hehe. I've told you before that you having companions would make you weak. But you wouldn't listen. You wanted her gone - you have her gone. You should be happy,' the demon said with a chuckle.

"I did not want her gone! I just wanted her to hunt by herself! You evil, vile, despicable, little bastard!" Tia shouted.

A wave of energy made Tia crumple to the ground, she panted and whimpered as she writhed on the ground, her senses trained in on the demon within her.

'Listen here you pathetic wrench. You are not in control here. I am. And I'm doing you a favor. She was going to leave you anyway. I've noticed when she packed her belongings every now and again. She's trying to leave you, but she can't do it when you're walking around at all hours of the night and day. Hehe..... Sad really.'

The demon's words had Tia in doubt. The last words Isabella said were to not look for her when she didn't come back. Did she really mean that? Was she going to leave this time? Tia whimpered at the idea, but shook herself. Maybe.... She was.... No! She was just hungry. Sometimes being hungry makes you grumpy. Yeah, that's it.

Tia wrestled with this for a long while. She tried to relax herself and wait for Isabella to come back, but the anxiety steadily grew. She couldn't contain it. By now, Isabella was probably feasting on a body right now. No, she's probably lost and trapped somewhere. Or maybe she got caught someplace where she can't escape, and she'll slowly starve to death!

The scenarios were too much. Tia got on her paws and left the cave with a worried hiss. She had to go and find Isabella before something happened. Then she had to go apologize to her, and maybe ask for her to not leave.... at least not yet.
 
Isabella stormed through the forest, taking long, meandering routes to try and calm herself down. Hunting while angry as never a good idea; you needed a clear head. Time passed, and she could finally think about her battle plan for getting fed. Maybe, she could also think about whether or not she meant what she'd said to Tia.

She decided to prioritise the former, and maybe not even think about the latter; at least not until she was fed.

There was one thing that Tia said that was true; if she waited until dark, she had a much better chance of getting a good kill. But at least for now, she could get into town, and find a good hunting spot.

It took her a little longer than she would have liked to admit to find her way out of the forest, but when she left the cave she'd been a lot more focused on being angry than not getting lost. It was by coming into the clearing that she'd first met Tia and Ms Baccay in that she realised that she'd gotten herself all turned around. She was just glad that there was no one around to see her mistake as she turned and hurriedly left the clearing.

She came to the town, and the sun was still high in the sky. It couldn't have been much later than midday, but as soon as she saw the people moving throughout the streets, Isabella knew that she wouldn't be able to wait until night. She could feel her stomach gnawing at itself, and her body trembled with the anticipation of something good to eat.

Breath shallow, she dipped into the back alleys.

Leaving her bone in a place she'd remember it, she moved through the streets quick as a cat, but found no one and nothing. Even when the main street was quiet, and when she risked a call for help, no one came. Blue Creek Valley's citizens clearly didn't trust anything right now; not like Isabella could blame them. Still, the pain in her stomach pushed her on, and in time she heard a muttering coming from behind a store.

She stumbled forwards, peering around the corner to see a tall woman, wide–framed but skinny, mumbling and huffing to herself as she struggled to unjam a bin from between another bin and a wall.

Isabella was so hungry that she didn't even see the gun on her hip.

She took a deep breath, and squeaked out a tiny, pathetic, "miss?"
 
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The woman paused when she heard a voice somewhere. She gasped and whirled to her right, all to suddenly see a girl. Her body tensed up and she snatched the gun from the holster and aimed it at the girl.

"Who the hell are you? Where'd you come from?" The woman asked. Her hands quivered as the gun was clenched in her hands -- she most likely had no clue how to hold a gun, which would be bad for everybody involved.

The woman muttered to herself and backed away from the girl. "Josh? Josh! Get over here now!" The woman cried out.




Tia panted as she ran towards the town. She couldn't drive Isabella away now! Not when she was beginning to feel what it was like to gave a companion. At least, she wished it was like that. She hoped that Isabella felt the same way, despite how insane Tia probably looked every other day.

Even when she was human she didn't have a true friend - she had many friendly acquaintances, but that was the furthest she had gone as far as platonic relationships were concerned. This time, Tia felt like she could actually have a friend in Isabella.

.... But if she kept driving Isabella away, then how could she have a friend?

Tia shook her head - she needed to focus. With a huff, Tia ran faster, hoping to find Isabella and help her with her hunt. Then maybe they could talk.

It wasn't long before she got to the barriers of the town. She sensed a great disturbance in the town. Many, if not all, of the residents were extremely nervous. She couldn't blame them. To them, some sick person was killing and eating humans. And in broad daylight. Either that, or it could be a hunting predator from the forest. Little would the people know that they would actually be right with both predictions.

Tia went to the closest and most hidden place to enter the borders of town, and crept as fast as she could to the building with a means to get to the rooftop. Surely, Isabella wouldn't risk being in the alleyways with everyone on alert.
She climbed to the rooftop the same way she did the first time, and soon she had her perch. The town, filled to the brim with nervous energy, was loud and quiet at the same time. One could clearly tell that people were working or driving, but that was it. Otherwise, there wasn't any laughter or general conversation. Very few people were walking the streets, and those that dared do so we're in groups of three or four. She sighed, and flicked her tongue to try and search for Isabella's scent.

'Come on. Give me something to work with,' Tia mentally begged.
 
Isabella saw the woman's movement, but didn't connect the dots until she was staring down the barrel of the gun. She gasped and cried out in fright, hands immediately lifting beside her head. As she did, she checked that her hat was pulled down, and that her eyes were covered.

Surely this was a bit much! All the woman saw was a kid!

She took a gasp of air, and blubbered out, "I, I'm Isabella! I, I'm six, and I, I, I'm lost!" She hated to admit it, but the tears gathering in her eyes weren't fake. She tried to keep her voice loud, hoping that someone would hear and stop this woman from shooting a kid.

The woman called back into the house, and Isabella knew that she had to finish this. Either she had to kill this woman and get her body away from there, or she had to run. Just as she shifted her feet to do the latter, the woman lifted the gun up higher, pointed directly between Isabella's eyebrows.

"You stay there!" She howled, hands trembling, finger on the trigger.

A sob bubbled up on Isabella's lips, and she stayed, entire body shaking.
 
The woman kept her gun trained on the girl before her, shaking and mumbling nervously as she backed away. After a minute, though it felt like an hour, someone came from out the door. It was a man, and he turned to see the woman pointing a gun at a girl.

He gasped and ran to the woman. "Cynthia! What the hell do you think you're doing with that?! I told you to throw out the trash, not to take a gun and go outside with the thing!" The man shouted. The woman turned around to see the man, and whimpered as she pointed at the girl.

"But the girl came out of nowhere! And you know about the.... murders. What if the murderer is out here now?" the woman tried to say in a whisper. The man groaned and snatched the gun from the woman named Cynthia.

"I knew I shouldn't have let you outside. Apparently, it doesn't sit well with you. Now move your ass inside the house," the man said as he put the gun in his back pocket. He turned to the girl and stared at her for a moment. His eyes shone with a strange and suspicious interest, a smirk gracing his face as he straightened out his clothes.

He turned to the girl and walked up to her, his face soon showing concern. "I apologize for my girlfriend's behavior. She's just the slightest bit loopy at the moment, and this whole town is on edge like a sharpened knife. What did you come here for? Where are your parents?" The man asked nicely.
 
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