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Listening intently to her statement about there being no difference between the altered humans and normal humans made Trela curious, 'No difference? Well, that's weird. Then again, you may think us being able to choose between our meals and our allies is weird too.' She chuckled, 'Altered humans are similar to the Nahzeetial ... being bonded with an animal and all. Normal humans are just .. normal.'

Trela burst into a fit of giggles, 'I like that .. superhero names sounds sweet, just nothing corny like "Captain Trela" or "Hawk Girl"!' Trela gave a devious smirk, 'The names will be original and sweeeeet!'

Her comment on the Old Man Marter made her chuckle, 'Sounds old .. usually humans taste better at about .. oh say, thirty or so.' She winked, of course she was joking; like she said, she's never really had human .. that she can remember of anyways, 'Ah, but I'm sure a little bit of ketchup can fix that right up!!' Bursting into a fit of giggles again, she looked at Hod, 'Do you like the sound of that? I could always save you a little piece of him as .. oh .. let's call it revenge!'

Astrid had not mentioned anything about the relationship between Hod and Old Man Marter, but it was just something you could tell .. obviously something horrible happened regarding this man and Hod .. better off for her to ask, 'This .. Old Man Marter .. what's his relation to all of this? Did he do something to you or Hod?'

Trela gasped at the story of Old Man Marter, 'That a*****e deserves to rot in hell! Killing a snake, why I never!' She paused, 'But then again, that's probably what you thought when I said Nahzeetial kill normal humans for supper.' She laughed nervously, 'But we don't need to worry about that!'

At the mention of Aanida, she cringed. She knew she'd have to tell her eventually, 'Aanida are similar to Nahzeetial .. except they are spider-people. I don't know why .. but we've had a rivalry against them for thousands of years. At least, I think we have.' A shrug, 'I don't know what happened to make us hate eachother though.'

Trela shivered, 'Tough and stringy .. sounds nasty. But I'd bite his face off for you and Hod anyways!' She cackled, then laughed.

Nodding, Trela looked from Hod to Astrid, 'Yeah .. they've got arms and legs, then four spider legs coming from their backs .. on top of that they've got normal eyes, then four to six extra ones. And .. they're human sized, so yes, they're big.' She grinned, 'But us Nahzeetial are bigger!' Wiggling proudly, she smirked.

The thought of a Nahzeetial and Aanida was odd to Trela, 'I don't know if we could. It's in our nature .. but then again .. a hawk and a snake .. hawks eat snakes .. and we're friends so you never know.' She grinned.

Trela grinned, 'I think I've tried human once actually .. I don't really remember much about it though. However, I remember it being a little too salty for my tastes.' She giggled. Of course, back then, she was still very young.

Giving that question some thought, she shrugged, 'Wow, beats me! That kind of sucks though .. I mean, if that happened.' Trela was perfectly happy with only having one set of eyes ... three or four sets would be too much for her.

And the thought of actually having legs was completely odd to Trela. Slithering just wouldn't be the same ...

Trela glanced down at Hod and smiled, 'He's so cute ...' But him sleeping reminded her of how tired she was as well.

A giggle and a yawn.

Why did a nap sound so .. appealing?

Trela nodded as she listened to Astrid, 'Nap sounds good .. after that, I'll probably be hungry anyways.' With a dull thud, Trela's tail hit the floor and she slithered over to her own bed.

Plopping down, the second her head hit the pillow she was out.

[End RP]

She opened her eyes slowly. Something was touching her face. It was soft, but cold. No -- there was more than one something touching her. All around her. It was cradling her body; falling on her like a blanket. Astrid's eyes fluttered slowly open.

A cold wind hit her, and she shut her eyes tightly. Cold, everywhere, was cold. Risking another glance, she peered carefully at her arm, laying just inches from her face. Something was whirling around it, landing on it, something was...

She snapped up quickly, pulling her legs closer to herself. A fierce, biting wind hit her in the back, making her shirt flap and swing in the air. Putting an arm up to shield her face, she saw it: snow, stretching as far as she could see, only yielding to rugged mountains off in the distance. Random crags of rock were scattered around the field of snow, too, almost looking like they had broke off from the mountains.

She huddled closer to herself, rubbing her arms hard. Where was this? Was this real? How did she even get here?

Her breath came out in swift puffs of smoke, sucked away by the wind so fast that she barely had time to notice the cloud in front of her mouth. Shivering, she pushed herself off the ground, holding her arms to her chest. The snow whirled around her, caking her eyeslashes. "Where am I?" she asked aloud. Her voice was lost in the wind.

She went to walk forward in the snow towards the mountains, but something stopped. Something...she didn't know what it was, but it hovered at the edge of her senses. Something was near her. Something was here.

Turning around slowly, her breath caught in her throat. Her hands flew up over her mouth as she stared at the huge mound of fur in front of her. It was almost like a hill of black fur, matted with snow and tiny icicles. Her heart beat as if it were going to break out of her chest. What the hell was that?

She stood stock still. By looking very hard, she could almost tell that the mound was moving. Then she noticed the pointed ears, and the face. It was a giant black wolf, laying asleep in the snow. It was covered in a blanket of snow already; Astrid guessed it had barely moved at all, because ice was forming on the tips of its ears and fur. Why was it there? Was it dead?

She moved a tiny bit closer, her boots crunching on the ground. Peeking down, she noticed something on its front paws, which its head was resting on. There were huge cuffs around its legs...and chains. Huge chains that snaked under its body, only noticeable from its fur because of the links that connected the cuffs to the ground. It's imprisoned?!

Walking slowly, she edged nearer to the wolf, snow on the end of its muzzle and the fur on its face. She was quite close now. Taking a very quiet step with her boot, she set her foot down on the ground.

It happened too fast for her to react. The wolf's head snapped up, its blazing ice-blue eyes staring straight into her own, as a puff of smoky air came from out of its huge nose. Astrid froze, easy to do in the freezing air, staring back at the wolf. She felt as if her heart had shuddered and stopped beating, lest the wolf hear it and attack. The giant chains clinked harshly on each other in the snow.

They stood there, regarding each other. Astrid held her breath, trying not to even breath. The beast stared back at her, its eyes flickering, over her tiny body. She was afraid. So often she never let herself even register fear, but this time, no, it was running through her veins like ice. It was going to attack her. It was going to attack her and swallow her whole and crunch her bones on the teeth that were probably as big as her body.

Even though the fear was infectious, she felt sorry for it in the back of her mind. The huge chains...had it tried to kill someone? Was that it? Why did she feel as if she cared so much? It could just as easily eat her, too.

The wolf continued to look her over. With a heavy heave off the ground, it raised itself to its snow-covered paws, scattering clumps of snow off of its body. It was even bigger than she had thought it was. Yet something, something, a feeling when she looked at it --

With a huge metallic clang, the wolf suddenly seemed to go at her, an ear-spliting yelp echoing off the mountains as the chains creaked and held it fast. Gasping, Astrid backed away, staring as the wolf strained on the chains. A growl started deep in the wolf's throat and it thrashed, howling and biting the air, sending snow flying as it tried to reach her. The same feeling that was on the edge of Astrid's thoughts felt like it moved into her chest, and she suddenly felt not that the wolf was trying to reach her to kill her, but that it was something else. She couldn't understand what she was feeling, but it welled up in her, and the thought exploded in her head: I have to set it free --

She went to break into a run for the chains on the wolf, one huge collar around its neck, over each of its legs --

-- but she couldn't move, She lurched forward, falling to her knees on the snow. She was trapped in place, and staring at her arms, she saw them: cuffs and chains, just like on the wolf, but on her own wrists and legs. What?!

Straining, the freezing steel cutting into her skin, she looked up the at the wolf, it too pushing on its fetters to reach her. Astrid yanked her arms foward but they stopped on their own, wrenched back by chains. "Dammit!" she yelled into the wind, tears slipping down her face. No! She had to free the wolf. She didn't even know why. "Can't you break those chains?! Look how big you are -- if you try, you can probably break them --"

The wolf stood panting, looking deep into her eyes, as if it wanted to say something. Fresh blood ran sluggishly from the gashes on its legs where the cuffs had chaffed the skin. Astrid was on her knees in front of it, struggling to get closer to it, but she held its gaze. Then it spoke: "...Not yet."

Astrid stared. Had it just talked? "What?" she asked loudly, the wind biting her ears and face. The wolf leveled its look. "...Not yet," it said, its voice carrying the faint trace of a growl. Astrid had no idea what to say. She could only stare at it, lost, utterly confused as to what it meant. "What do you mean, 'not yet'?"

"Not yet," the wolf said, its voice sounding fainter, and fainter. All around her, the tundra, the wolf, the whirling snow was fading into darkness.

Into darkness...

Astrid blinked slowly. Before her was no longer the wolf, nor the snowy landscape. Everything was black, except for something standing near her. It was covered in a large grey, tattered cloth, and there was nothing else. Astrid had a huge impulse to take the cloth off whatever it was -- its probably a statue or something like that. The thought of the wolf flitted to the back of her mind.

She walked up to the thing, grasping some of the cloth in her hand. With a flourish, she flicked her wrist and sent the cloth flying off what was underneath.

It was a mirror. A tall mirror -- and yet, she was staring right into it, and there was no reflection there.

Astrid allowed herself a bit of an amused smirk while she looked into the blank mirror. It would just figure there would be nothing there, wouldn't it. It would just figure...

And yet, a figure appeared in it, fading slowly into a clear image. Astrid blinked, looking back at the person in the glass, who gave her the same amused smirk she had just given the blank mirror. He was taller than she was, with red-orange hair down a bit past his shoulders. He looked lithe and quick, and there was something about his eyes that made Astrid feel as if she couldn't quite look away. His eyes had something of a flash in them when he flicked his eyes.

Astrid tilted her head somewhat, interested. Standing in front of the mirror, she put her hand out towards the pane of glass. The man on the other side smiled wider, and then he extended his hand towards where Astrid's was resting on the glass. Astrid watched his hand press up against where her own was, and while she was looking the man over again, she felt a pang in her side. Falling to one knee on the dark floor, one hand pressed over her chest, her breath came heavily. What was wrong? What's happening?!

Snapping her head up, the mirror was gone. Now only the man stood there, and she on the floor. She tried to push herself up, but her breath came painfully and her remaining dropped to the ground. Fighting to get a solid breath in her lungs, a hand came slowly into her vision. She turned her head upwards again, and there was the man; it was his hand, as if he were offering to help her up. She reached out a shaky hand to accept.

Except something was wrong, her hand didn't look right. Bringing it to her eyes, she looked at it, and then her other hand -- and then her clothes -- she stood up suddenly, out of shock, staring at herself. And then, the man. Looking at him, her eyes were level with his. Strands of orange hair were in her eyes.

She was him.

"What --" Astrid started aloud, clapping a hand over her mouth when she heard her voice did not sound like her own anymore. Is this what HIS voice sounds like...

The man flicked out a finger, holding it up carefully over his lips. A bit of a devious smile played across his face. The man brought his hand back to himself, and then extended it to her again. Only this time, something slithered out from under his sleeve.

A snake, and if Astrid wasn't mistaken, she recognized it.

"Hod!" she said. The man dropped Hod to the ground, and Astrid gave him a disgusted look before going to pick Hod up. Only she found it impossible: Hod was too big. And getting bigger.

Hod spasmed on the ground, his body lengthening and stretching to an impossible size. It was like the giant wolf, only this was instead a giant snake. The head lengthened out, Hod's black eyes flashing with a red light. That isn't Hod anymore --

Hod's coils doubled, tripled, quadrupled. Astrid stared up at the head growing increasingly farther above her. The man from the mirror seemed completely unphased by it, and walked closer to her. Astrid's eyes snapped to him, and she went to demand he explain what was happening to Hod. Just as he opened her mouth, the man walked closer, so that their faces were barely an inch apart. And he kept walking. Into her. Through her.

Her body seized up. She would have fallen to the ground, had the snake not wrapped itself around her, securing her in place. Her stomach lurched with her head and chest, her head thrown back to look at the snake's head far above her. Her breathing was ragged and heavy. She felt strange, her stomach torn between being nauseous and doing cartwheels. Sweat beaded up on brow and trickled down, causing her to shake and try to keep it out of her eyes. The snake loomed above her.

"Wha," she gasped out, her eyes half-lidded and hard to keep open. The snake brought its head close to her, flicking out its forked tongue over her. Somehow she felt calm seeing it, even though she knew it wasn't Hod at all. "What's happening," Astrid said, sucking in a shaky breath, feeling hot and sticky with sweat.

"Do not fear, Father," the snake hissed, its face very close. Its eyes were the pits on the sides of its face. Astrid spasmed painfully again, her head dropping to her chest, hair in her eyes. Red-orange hair; she was still the same image of the man... The snake's coils tightened around her.

What? Father? Who? Astrid forced her head up, her hair obscuring some of her view. Her face contorted in pain that ran throughout her body, but which was fading slowly. "Who," she coughed out, "is that."

"Relax, Father," the snake said. Its tongue flicked back out and in. Astrid's head rolled back; she was staring upwards again, feeling the pain retreated. Her stomach kept turning inside while she looked up, the snakes head moving into her view. It looked blurred, and blurrier each second. It seemed to be fading, like the pain, melting into the dark sky. Fading. Fading...into darkness.

She gasped, jerking up. Yet something cut into her again, and the clanking of chains told her that she was pinned down. Her vision swimming, she looked wildly around, trying to figure out where she was. All she could take in was that she was in some kind of dark cave, with a ceiling high above her. And she couldn't move.

Struggling, she tried to get up, but found herself stuck even moreso than she had been before. Something jutted painfully into her back and limbs. It felt like rock. She must be chained to a rock.

Trying to see more of the cave, she attempted to shove her body farther up the rock, but she couldn't do that either. The chains were cold and the cuffs tight. Astrid went limp, breathing deeply, trying to understand. Her body, she noticed, looked like her own now. A sound brought her back to what senses she had left.

Somehow she hadn't noticed the woman very near to her. There was no way she was there before this --

Astrid stopped breathing. The woman, very near to her, had something very impossible about her features.

The woman had no face.

Where the should have been eyes, and a nose, and a mouth, there was nothing. The skin was stretched smooth over these places, as if there might have once been something, but there was nothing now. Astrid's breath came back to her, but she was breathing so fast she felt dizzy. She tried to kick off from the floor and get away from the woman, but the rock was part of the formation of the floor and would not move. The chains strained her legs and arms. The faceless woman had long hair and bangs, and looked alive. But how? How was she real?! She had no face!

Astrid sunk back into the rock, trying to calm herself. The woman didn't move. Astrid watched her silently, trying to figure out what she was doing...then she noticed the woman's arm was raised above where Astrid could see, because the rock was against her head and she couldn't move. Straining, Astrid turned her head up in the direction the woman's arm was. The woman was holding something above Astrid's head. It looked like wood. No, it's a...bowl. A wooden bowl.

For one horrible moment Astrid thought the woman was going to pour something on her head. But the woman wasn't moving.

And then, she was.

She sighed -- how?! how can she even breathe? -- and spoke: "Oh, my husband, the gods are cruel." Then she leaned close enough to brush again Astrid's cheek, and suddenly she had eyes, and lips, and a nose. A face. The woman kissed Astrid on the cheek softly and affectionately, and pulled away, faceless almost instantly as she pulled back. Astrid was too stunned to do anything, but she yelped aloud seeing the woman's face vanish as she moved away.

Staring wide-eyed as the woman walked quickly to the other side of the cave, Astrid felt something drip onto her face. Blinking, she instinctively tried to touch it with her hand, but she couldn't move it. Struggling, she felt it drip onto her face again. And again. Tiny droplets of something wet, that seemed to sting.

She blinked again, and flicked her eyes upwards. Something was suspended over her, and she recognized the form immediately. A snake. Only this was not the huge snake from before, nor was it Hod. It held itself over her, its mouth open wide. Squinting, Astrid tried to see what it was doing. Then she saw it: tiny beads of liquid forming on the end of the snake's fangs. What was happening hit her. Liquid from the snake's mouth. Venom. It was dripping venom --

And a droplet landed right into one of her open eyes.

It stung, it burned, it hurt beyond anything; she screamed, shattering the silent air of the cave, spasming and convulsing as the drops fell onto her face, onto her eyelids, seeping in; she was screaming, as the fire ripped her eyes apart and let them bleed down her face. Only there was no blood, only poison, only poison dripping into her eyes and running down her face like tears and sinking into her skull and making her wish the snake that was somewhere up there would just bite her and kill her and make it stop.

Her body wouldn't stop seizing up, even as she screamed and flung herself against the rock, against the bed, against the rock, against the bed; even as she pulled on the chains, on the covers, and slipped off her bed in a heap of sheets.

Breathing heavily, Astrid stared around her. Her room. Her room in the academy, and she was practically on the floor, tied up in her covers from her bed. She relaxed very slowly, feeling herself tense up every few seconds. It had been so real. She had even thought it was real.

She brought her hands up to her face, looking at them. They were her hands. She brought her arms around herself and rubbed them hard to remind herself that this was real, not before. That was only a dream.

Sighing, she lay back in her mess of sheets, looking up at the ceiling. Only a dream. The wolf, the chains, all of it, just a dream.

She closed her eyes.

Just a dream...

...then why do I still feel the same feeling in my stomach? She turned over on her side, putting her head in one of her hands. Just a dream.

Only a dream.