The Virgin Forest
Deep in a forest, likely on Earth, there are seven vaguely feminine non-human humanoid beings that are all sprawled around each other in the luscious undergrowth that is commonly found in old growth forests.
The first being is tall and slender with iridescent purple feathers coating her large wings and comprising her tail. All six of her toned, deep umber arms are gesticulating frenetically. Her full lips are enunciating fluently and occasionally exposing four pairs of sharp canines, four on the top and four on the bottom. She is often described as 'silver-tongued', rarely tongue-in-cheek, as she could sell a whole closet of shoes to a shark-mermaid. This woman, Leslie, is evidently regaling the six other non-human humanoids with a story. She sits solidly upright, her presence and voice commanding the full attention of the six others around her.
However, one being sends off an evidently irritated aura; she sits with her tail-fur bristled and her wing feathers fluffed up, this being is Circe.
In Leslie's lap, another woman's head lies. This head is cushioned slightly by the other woman's meticulously-styled, short, black curls, are pressed against Leslie's long thighs. Her round, shrewd crimson eyes look up with a sleepy warmth at Leslie's violet trio of eyes. Her dark brown eyelids are half-mast and thick-curly eyelashes slightly obscure her vertically slit pupils and the faint glow of her eyes. This woman, named Nina, has her legs precisely set out in front of her, one plump leg with a large zygodactyl foot with well-manicured talons, the other leg ends at her knee. Nearby, Nina's cane lies parallel to her prosthetic leg and its components are set in a neat pile close together. Nina sits up carefully and leans her rotund cheek against Leslie's bony shoulder. While doing this, Nina swiftly fixes her own slightly-mussed hair. She lets out a quiet huff as she finds and removes leaves out of her curly head-feathers.
Now, Nina's raven wings are draped loosely over the white woolly body of Mariah behind her. This sheep-like body, is connected to the chubby torso of a person, one who is atypically pale and is covered by thick, yellow, sun-protective fabric. Attached to this set of torsos is a person's head, atop the fluffy, light-flaxen colored hair lays a floppy sun hat that has holes for her large curled ram-horns and her pointed sheep ears which are tilted intently towards her lover, Leslie. Mariah's ears perk up and her two, ice pale eyes widen when she hears Leslie's tone of voice change to one of alarm.
"Sally!" Leslie whines while swatting away a long-braided horse's tail which is attached to the aforementioned Clydesdale-centaur. She startles and Sally's deep brown eyes with horizontally slit pupils focus on those of her girlfriend. Mariah hears her sibling, Sky, let out a surprised squeak from in front of the piled quartet of lovers that Mariah is a component of at the present. Beside Sky, Circe laughs at their adorable sound and Miranda giggles softly behind her dark umber hand as well. Sky blushes a bright rose at this and hides a chuckle and their face, behind a set of clawed and scarred pair of their six hands.
"Oh my goodness, leave me alone!" Sky groans at Circe and Miranda with a voice that is only slightly deeper than their high-pitched squeak. They remove their hands from their face and use one to twirl a lock of their blonde hair-like head-feathers around one of their pale index fingers. They avert their eyes as their blush fades.
"Lll....Leslie? Uhhh what? W-w-what's... uhh what's going on?" Sally's head snaps to the side and her ears twitch forward, as if coming out of a daze, at the Siren next to her. Leslie laughs, not at Sally's stutter, but at her dazed countenance making her properly look like startled prey, then with narrowed eyes, Sally sticks her tongue out at her. Leslie shakes her head fondly and her violet, beaded, Fulani braids jangle and brush against Leslie's pointy, feathery ears and high cheek bones.
In front of this, all four of Circe's sharp crimson eyes crinkle at the edges in response to something Sky whispers quietly to her. Miranda, a tall Woodland-Elf, can be seen drawing some sort of vehicle blue-print on her tablet, using her vines to hold it flat in front of her. A soft close-mouthed smile graces her features.
"Welcome back to Earth, Darling! I was just asking you to puhh-lease stop whapping me with your tail!" Leslie drawls as she dramatically leans over to Sally, both disturbing Nina's comfortable position and exposing Leslie's ample cleavage in one fell swoop. Sally quickly ogles down at Leslie's chest, then back up to Leslie's arched eyes and eye brows. A deep blush stains Sally's round cheeks as Leslie looks at her knowingly with a sultry smirk upon her face.
"I-I-I-I uh, I'm sorry L-l-les'!" Sally responds apologetically and coyly shifts her bottom half further away from Leslie. Suddenly, Nina's eyes sparkle with an idea and she leans closer towards Sally, then, Nina leaves a noisy kiss on one of the deeply tanned and freckled cheeks of Sally. Nina pulls back with a mischievous beam, Sally figuratively and literally follows Nina's actions of revenge at Leslie by moving and upsetting Nina's comfortable spot from before.
Nina quickly straightens up the best that she can and pulls Sally in to deeply kiss her on the lips, a smug smile on both of their faces while doing this. Mariah looks on with apparent interest; her rectangular pupils dilate minutely. Leslie lets out an indignant squawk at this obvious rejection of her attempts at flirtation, Circe rolls all four of her eyes at this. Sky, in quick order, whoops approvingly then flashes Leslie an apologetic smile. Then, their eyes focus on Nina and Sally, both of whom have ceased kissing at this point.
"Aww you two! So cute!!" Sky coos putting the top two of their palms on their face, one on each cheek, in an exaggerated expression of adoration.
"This shit again, for fuck's sake Leslie." Circe looks heavenward, mutters under her breath and lets out a sigh as Leslie dramatically and loudly berates Nina and Sally, begging for their attention. Sky shoots Circe a mildly disappointed look at that, then turns around with an amused visage. Miranda continues to sketch on her tablet serenely, heedless of the pandemonium around her, with her prominent elfin ears' flutters being the only indication that she is even processing the external auditory stimuli at all.
Sky wriggles their bright white peacock tail and cups the top set of their hands around their mouth to shout towards the trio as Mariah bursts into giggles at the sight of all three of her girlfriends causing a bit of a scene yet again.
"Hey you three!" Sky shouts and draws their attention as three heads snap towards them. Mariah continues to giggle at her girlfriends' antics. "Get a fucking room!" Sky continues humorously and Leslie leans closer to them provocatively as a result. Sky lets this happen with their grin frozen on their face, still unable to predict Leslie's response even after knowing her for actual eons.
"Only if you join us!" Leslie sing-songs seductively with a shit-eating smile. Sky giggles, slightly relieved, after they unfreeze. Circe growls lowly, exposing a full set of razor-sharp teeth while Leslie keeps lunging forward, continuing to invade Sky's personal space, which, to be fair, is quite minuscule. Leslie braces her bottom pair of hands on either side of Sky's rainbow-clad thighs. Sky appears unfazed by this development. Circe does not, and appears quite irate, her tail fur is bristled and her wing feathers are fluffed up again.
"I'll rip out your spleen and force you to eat it!" Circe grits out quietly, Mariah looks at her with concern etched on her features. Nina chuckles softly as if she knows something that the others don't, Circe's glare shifts rapidly to her, then settles back on Leslie. Sky flinches at Circe's threat because of how forceful it was said rather than a response to the content of what she said.
"Puh-lease! You're much more likely to set my shit on fire." Leslie retorts expressing her disinterest with a flippant flap of one of her top hands and an exaggerated eye-roll.
"Then I'll set you on fire!" Circe shouts and Leslie scoffs with another eye roll.
Sky leans away slightly and whispers something to Miranda. As a delayed result, Miranda nimbly pulls Circe away from Leslie and into Miranda's lap. Circe squeaks indignantly in shock. Miranda begins running some of her free vines through Circe's hair, mindful of Circe's two pairs of sharp horns while deftly undoing Circe's inky braid.
Sky watches them with a longing sort of interest, moves with a gentle push out of Leslie's grasp, then more clearly and verbally responds to what Circe said with a dramatized look of shock.
"Wait! Hold on! Circe, you clearly stole the spleen threat from me! How dare you! I feel so! Betrayed!" Sky says incredulously with a finger jab, places a hand on their chest, and pretends to fall back theatrically. Circe rolls her eyes with a small smile; Leslie lets out a quick chuckle and so do the other girls.
Sky pops back up, then twirls back to Leslie with a confident smirk and an accusing claw pointed at Leslie. "Aaaand to your prior preposition Leslie! Ha ha! You're so cute! No thanks hun! But, as always, I'm flattered!" Sky chirps with a smile, and pats Leslie's cheek with one of their pale, freckled hands. "And you already have a blonde silly! Remember? My sister?" They continue with their bottom set of hands on their hips and a head tilt towards her. Mariah waves cheekily at Sky from where she's typing on her recently summoned laptop and Sky waves back at her. Leslie sits there dumbstruck, but nods back anyway.
Abruptly, Sky stands up, their long and cumbersome tail swishing cheerfully behind them as they turn bodily away from Leslie to watch Miranda and Circe as Circe complains about Leslie while Miranda continues to draw. Sky chews and sucks on an ink-dipped thumb-claw lost in thought.
Leslie begins to sing quietly to herself and fiddles with something on her phone. Sky then appears to remember something and they turn back around to face Leslie again, more serious this time.
"Also, Leslie!" Sky shouts while looking at her, Leslie snaps to attention with a questioning head tilt and a quiet affirming noise. "Please don't have sex in MY room, in MY bed. AGAIN." Sky states with a slightly bitter tone. Mariah groans and hides in her hands with shame, her coding work forgotten as embarrassment washes over her. Leslie barks out a surprised laugh and wiggles the pointer finger of her top left hand teasingly.
"Ehhhhh. No promises Darling! Also, that was ONE time!" Leslie grouses and flings out all six sets of her hands expressively and then puts them on her hips and lower torso. "Also, we've apologized like a billion times! I can't believe you still haven't gotten over it!"
"It was one time too many! Also, I had to see you with my sister for goodness sake! So, yeah! The room you all get cannot be my room! Please! For the love of rabbits!" Sky groans dragging a set of claws down their face in frustration, their wide, golden, eyes becoming larger as they do this action. Leslie giggles at their histrionics, the ones that she basically taught them.
"And how would you feel if you had to see Laxno and Stacy going at it in your bed?" Sky continues with less irritation in their voice, they're clearly trying to get Leslie to empathize with them. Leslie's shoulders shake with a disgusted shiver at the thought of her sibling doing what Sky had just described.
"Okay, fine, I suppose so Darling! Point taken! Eugh! Since you've twisted my arm about it! And grossed me out quite a bit! Sheesh." Leslie responds shrilly with a flap of one hand, the other being used to respond to a text on her phone without looking at it. She then quickly pockets it and looks up. Sky signs her a quick 'thanks' with a beatific grin on their face.
"You're quite welcome Sweetie!" Leslie chirps in response while stroking Sky's head feathers, avoiding their crest feathers. Sky beams wider and leans into the touch with a quick eyelash flutter and a soft hum.
"Your head feathers are so super soft Sky! Also, I'll flatter you whenever you'd like!" Leslie purrs with a deeper tone. Sky giggles again and pulls away from her. Their legs curl under them. Leslie whips out her phone again to answer a new message. Sky pops one of their pinkie-claws in their mouth and rolls their tongue around it.
"Disgusting. You're disgusting." Circe states darkly in reference to either Leslie's blatant flirting or their previous topic of conversation. She was listening as she has difficulty filtering any stimuli out, unfortunately, as she would love to have the ability to tune out Leslie's voice even once since making her acquaintance. Leslie rapidly about faces, both her previous grin and her phone drop as she jabs an angry finger in Circe's face.
Sky flinches back at this. Maybe having two people with Cluster B personality disorders in such a small space, at the same time, especially those who both hate each other, isn't such a good idea. Specifically these two who argue like crazy! They think warily with a smaller smile written on their face as the previous larger one is fading. They cover their feathered ears with their top set of hands in preparation for the yelling that is bound to occur. Leslie is unable to let anything go and she always loves a good show, as long as she's at the center of attention of course. And, Circe, who is impulsive, and generally hostile to the purple-feathered Siren, also doesn't demonstrate enough self-control regarding her negative expressions towards her.
"Oh! You're one to talk!" Leslie snarks back at her, Circe grits her teeth and tosses up her top set of hands sitting up and out of Miranda's lap to lunge closer to Leslie. More movement is seen as Mariah fixes her dark sunglasses on her nose and Circe jumps, still sitting, to get even nearer to Leslie, almost brushing noses with her.
Miranda saves her work and teleports both her pen and tablet back to their house. She looks up and appears slightly despondent at the loss of one of her best friends in her lap. To resolve this, she pulls Sky by their muscular torso into her lap as a proper replacement. Their hands drop from their ears and they look up at her with a soft smile as Miranda stares off into the distance, flowers happily popping up in the grass around them. Sky's talons are rhythmically rebounding off the grass, killing the spontaneous blossoms circling them.
"What does that even mean you asshole?!" Circe retorts simultaneously confused and furious, her top set of hands held palm up, and her bottom set of hands firmly planted palm down on the ground in front of her. Both women have their eyebrows furrowed and scowls besmirch their countenances.
"Okaaaay, let's not do this shit again, please." Sky groans exasperatedly; they physically drag Circe away by both of her bottom forearms with no small amount of strength. Nina huffs out an exasperated sigh and slides belly-down across Mariah's sheep body. Mariah shoots her, and then the two arguing women, a concerned and then moderately alarmed face, then, she attends to her computer screen again.
"Honestly, y'all know better than this. Please let's not." Nina commands sternly after sliding and then sitting up against Mariah's sheep-body so as to appear larger and more commanding.
"Yeah! Don't do that and come sit with us!" Sky says with faux-cheer while looking at Circe hopefully. After a beat, Miranda nods in agreement, her multitude of earrings swinging with this movement. "Please?" With her head angled, Sky tacks on hoping that politeness is enough to lessen the escalation of this petty argument, also making their most pathetic pouty face in case the politeness marker isn't enough.
Circe shoots Leslie one last glare, and huffs out a frustrated, extended exhale. "Fine. I'll appease you." Circe directs to Sky, acting quite put-upon, but still giving them a smile that was considered quite sweet, for Circe's standards anyway. "Not like it'd benefit me in any way to try to fight a pacifist." She gripes referring to Leslie with an aggressive head gesture.
Leslie sticks her tongue out at her childishly, and before she can retort, gets pulled into a pile with Nina, Sally, and Mariah. Mariah rapidly shuts and sends her laptop away in order to give Leslie her full attention. Sky furrows their brows in bemusement at Circe.
"I literally don't understand what's going on right now. However, if you really want to 'appease me' as you said, you'd be sitting in Miri's lap. With me!" Sky says brightly with a 'come here' gesture with one of their middle sets of hands while looking for split ends in their head-feathers with one hand and twirling a large chunk of head-feathers with another. Their bottom set of hands hang limply, their palms tightly wrapped in cloth bandages dyed with dried, golden ichor that bled through earlier. They then tense the bottom set of hands to run their fingertips through the soft grass and flowers around them, heedless of the sharp pain that radiates from the center of the palm of their bottom two hands at their actions.
"Sure, okay, fine." Circe says coolly while gently moving Sky to one side of Miranda's lap, so that she can sit on the other leg. Sky shifts to sit sideways on Miranda's leg and faces Circe with a giant, pointed, grin. Their bottom pair of hands lift up as they go to clap, but then remember that they shouldn't do that so they just stay awkwardly poised midair.
"Absolutely, indeed, certainly, and other forms of agreement." Sky deadpans with nods after each word, and Circe huffs out a laugh. "And yay!" Sky shouts excitedly with a clap of their middle hands. They drop their blonde head-feathers, and wrap their top arms around Circe's neck, their middle arms around her torso, and gingerly place their bottom set of hands on the tops of Circe's sinewy, denim-clad, thighs. "I mean. Bloody brilliant!" They correct with a flawless accent-shift, Circe and Miranda laugh.
"And now you're English or British. Excellent." Circe attempts to say sarcastically, but fails as she chuckles and snuggles up in Sky's arms while wrapping her two pairs of arms around Sky with a small smile.
A warm feeling flutters up in Sky's chest as a result and they seem to be unsure how to deal with it. Thus, they wrack their brain for any sort of response. The sound of the other girls fading in the background as they focus on those closer around them. They reach a decision.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
"Sooooo, do you come here often?" Sky says jokingly in attempts to break the perceived tension they feel. Circe gives a small chuckle and lets go of Sky. They smile sunnily at Circe's response. She's so cute when she smiles. Sky thinks. I could and should make her do it more, I probably can I think? They bite their bottom lip in thought. "Uhh... Fancy meeting you here? Are you from Tennessee, because you're the only ten I see!" They continue and Circe shakes her head with a smile, a faint plop sounds as she leans on Miranda's plump shoulder while gazing at Sky with a look that Sky hopes means you adorable asshole.
Egged on by this response, Sky continues to spout out cheesy pick up lines: "Did it hurt when you fell from heaven?" They pause for effect. "Because you're literally part angel." Circe huffs out a laugh and Miranda chuckles, but seems to feel slightly left out. Her face scrunches lightly in thought.
"Did you... scrape your knees... crawling your way up from Hell?" Miranda adds with a tiny smile. Sky turns to her with a gigantic beaming grin, likely due to Miranda playing along with them.
"Why because she's also part demon?" Sky asks quizzically tilting their head at her. Miranda blinks her doe-like eye quickly and her slender elfin ears twitch. Sky gives her a moment to process the auditory information.
"Huh? Oh! Yes. This was my intention." Miranda gives a subtle nod and Sky guffaws in response.
"Clever! Nice work!" Sky comments appreciatively while twirling their middle hands in Miranda's long pink silk skirt. Circe silently agrees with a nod while stretching her smoky grey, feathery wings behind her. A soft smile graces Miranda's features.
Sky thinks and waits a beat, hand to their chin, then: "Aside from being sexy, what do you do for a living?" They purr at Circe, who bolts upright in surprise, her fluffy snow leopard tail stiffens behind her in response. Miranda jolts slightly underneath them in reply to Circe's reaction.
"I, uh, what?" Circe responds, quite flustered. Miranda pauses for a few moments to process what Sky said, her ears flicking in thought, her thumb pressed to her bottom lip and her tongue lightly lapping at her thumb-nail, which Sky watches with apparent interest.
"She is a.... neurologist Sky. I was under the... impression that you knew this." Miranda almost asks, or comments, it is unclear based on her tone alone. Sky internally cringes with a grimace and flaps their hands in an attempt to disperse or shoo away their awkwardness. Their shoulders and wings hunch up instinctively in concern.
"Sorry! I do know that! I was just trying to continue the corny pick up lines jokey tangent thingy we were doing, I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable Circe, I'm super sorry!" Sky claims remorsefully, their middle set of hands clasp together and their bottom set fidget with the colorful fabric of their dress and their eyes downcast.
Circe melts into a more relaxed position and leers at Sky who calms down instantly once they feel the shift in Circe's aura and realize that she isn't upset with them or genuinely uncomfortable. Sky's white wings and tail ruffle and shuffle behind them to relieve the tension they built up in their body, their shoulders drop as well. Circe then seems to force herself to startle back, her eyes blinking swiftly to regain her composure and sits up smoothly while looking away from Sky and re-braiding her lengthy black head-feathers.
"No worries my Dove. I wasn't even paying attention." She lies easily while trying to play off her previous discombobulation, pulling a red hair tie from her wrist and tying the ends of her hair.
Sky nods befuddled, but pretending that they have any idea how to read people simpler than Circe's complex sort of mix of inexplicable mood swings.
"Okay, good then! I'm glad! That's fortunate then, it didn't appear that way, but like, I've been wrong before and can't read people all that well, so what do I know?" Sky says with a shrug and a smile. They seem to shake themselves and sit up.
Sky claps their top set of hands together, plastering on a shaky smile. "Alright, okay, I sorta fucked that up! But, we can move on! Miri!" Miranda belatedly perks up. She drops a small braid surprise. Circe's tail flicks behind her lazily. Miranda lifts up a clump of her micro-vines to begin another braid.
"Yes Sky?" She asks without looking up, in the middle of braiding another lock of her pale pink curly micro-vines with deft fingers.
"Would you be able to tell us about the trees around us please?" Sky begs with their middle set of hands clasped together in a pleading gesture, clearly looking for a way away and out of the awkward situation that they constructed unintentionally.
"Yes I can." Miranda responds with a mildly expressed enthusiasm, but she is legitimately quite excited. "Well...Did you know that.... an old growth forest.... is also known as a 'virgin forest'?'" Miranda elucidates.
"So the forest we're in hasn't been fucked yet?" Circe drawls and Sky barks out a laugh, their top hands cover their mouth.
"Does that mean that most people, or at least those who came up with that name, are dendrophiles? That is good news for Dryads then huh? Or maybe bad news if they're not into it as well! Although being a virgin is an arbitrary idea that forests might not adhere to anyway!" Sky muses through a fit of giggles, gazing off into the distance. "Oopsie! Sorry for interrupting Miri! Please continue!" They say with a hand wave as they look at Miranda apologetically.
Miranda speaks at length about all of the plants that she knows about and wishes to speak about at the current moment. When she's finished, Sky suddenly stands up, looks around and realizes that the other four women had left without them. They tell this to Circe who appears unperturbed.
"Yeah they texted us in the group chat like, hours ago. I told them it was fine." Circe says off-hand, while doing... something on their phone. Sky stares at her for a moment.
"Oh that's... fine I suppose. May we please go home now too please?" Sky, questions, with clasped upper hands clearly asking if Miranda or Circe can teleport them home. Then they re-think that thought through with a shudder and drop their hands. They look around the forest they're surrounded by. "Or we could walk home, as teleporting is awful." Sky continues and Circe scoffs at that.
"Only because you're awful at it." Circe derides jokingly and rolls her eyes while standing up, placing her phone in her pocket. Sky gives a tiny puff of laughter at that and bends down to tap lightly on Miranda's arm. She catches on and gracefully rises as well, giving her a good three feet or so on the two other beings. They both peer up at her and she gazes off into the distance. She dusts off and re-adjusts her skirt.
"Hmm. True! That's why I hang around you two!" Sky chirrups with a slight sneer and then a genuine grin as they spin around and laugh internally and then externally at their own joke. They throw their bottom set of arms behind the small of their back with their hands lightly clasped together as they twirl clumsily around to face the two women. Miranda continues to walk forwards, presumably out of the woods.
"Psssh, you'd be lost without us of course." Circe quips back at Sky while waving her hand in an obviously sort of gesture.
"I'm lost with you two anyway, but I do have a fuck-ton of more fun if y'all are there!" Sky responds purely with a radiant smile and Circe stops walking in her tracks momentarily, she looks over to Miranda to check on her. Miranda also seems taken aback as well, her eyelashes fluttering in confusion. She is still facing the other way however, she likely saw Sky in her periphery.
"Thank you." Miranda comments back later with a small smile that is no less radiant, but is again, unfortunately, hidden behind her large hand. She finally faces the other two non-human humanoids.
"You're welcome my Goddess!" Sky says with a grin and a tiny curtsy, slightly lifting the bottom of their rainbow-colored dress as they tend to do whenever someone compliments them while they're wearing a dress or skirt. Miranda blushes at that, as unnoticeable as always on her round face that is a rich, slightly flushed, polished ebony with cheeks speckled lightly with glowing pink freckles, yet she feels it warm her cheeks nonetheless. Sky blushes brightly after processing what they just said while their peaches-and-cream skin becomes much more peaches than cream.
"Oh man, disregard that, I'm a huge dumbass who needs to think before I speak!" Sky groans muffled, ensconced in their own tiny hands. Miranda and Circe chuckle at that. Miranda is walking past Sky while gently brushing her hand over Sky's fluffy crest feathers, tugging them lightly in the wrong way and sending a pleasant shiver down their spine. Their breath catches somewhere in their throat, likely part-way through my trachea they think distantly. Their cheeks flush even more and their hearts race.
"Well, at least you're self-aware!" Circe retorts, all but skipping ahead towards Sky and shooting them a smile so that they know that she's joking, Sky of course does not see this as they are too busy wallowing in their embarrassment and dealing with other emotions that they can't really seem to process while hiding in their hands to look up at her. Circe's smile quickly wanes as she notices that Sky isn't looking at her, she internally shrugs, why should she care about the well-being of some naive, gullible Siren anyway? Because you love them. Her internal voice, that of logical reasoning and not Circe's conscience claimed as Circe isn't sure if she was ever given a conscience when whatever bullshit matter coalesced to create her physical form so many eons ago. Well we sure as fuck can't let them know that now can we? Circe remarks drolly to her inner voice. She continues to ponder this while drumming her fingers on both of her legs while she walks in circles.
"I am painfully self-aware." Sky breathily states with an airy laugh, finally out of their hiding place in their hands and rushing forward, slightly lifting their train so as not to get the brilliant white of their tail feathers dirty. Their eyes flit over to the Demon-Angel.
"Good thing... you are a masochist then." Miranda answers with an impish quirk of her pillowy lips, providing the faintest reveal straight of rows of horrifyingly serrated teeth that both Circe and Sky deeply desire for Miranda to sink into their soft, sensitive areas, namely their necks and base of their wings. Sky's breath hitches and they are so deeply in the middle of vividly picturing the previous image that they almost miss Circe breathily murmur: "Fuckin' same". Both stare with wide eyes at her mouth.
"Yup. Of course. Absolutely." Sky replies absent-mindedly shaking their head, having to force themselves not to float to get a better look at Miranda's mouth as it's so elusive and ephemeral when they get a chance to see her mouth not hidden behind her hand. They ruffle the feathers of their tail and wings in attempts to shake away the harsh heat that they feel settling deep in their abdomen.
Circe is stood stock-still as well, all four of her vertically slit pupils are dilated. Miranda waits a long beat for them to say more, as they usually do, but no more words are forthcoming from either of their mouths. Sky appears to open and close their mouth, but they can't get anything out other than some incomprehensible sounds from their vocal folds, a few of which almost sound like soft whines. They both continue to stare at Miranda's mouth and her teeth. Circe doesn't even try to talk at this point.
"Why are you two... all broken?" Miranda asks a tad concerned. That successfully befuddles and startles Sky out of their temporary stupor. Their clear nictitating membranes flicker horizontally over their eyes a bit before their opaque eyelids as they strive to finish blinking their way out of it.
"I am unaware of your meaning? Can you elaborate for me please?" Sky queries pedantically, their foot talons digging into the dirt as they figuratively and literally grasp for coherence, their top and middle hand claws digging into the divots of scars left from their stigmata from many, many, moons and lifetimes ago. Circe is still aware enough to realize that they are doing this and grab at their hands to stop them from harming themselves, while still mostly spacing out.
"You two were.... quiet? For a bit? It was... odd?" Miranda inquires after pondering it for a moment. Sky notices Circe stopping them from hurting their hands and signs a quick 'thank you' at her. Sky takes a deep breath to center themselves. Then they take another, just for good measure to dissipate the remaining heat in the lower middle of their torso. Their wing feathers fluff up as they shake out their shoulders and unfurl their wide, white wings, their golden eye markings on their feathers glinting in the low sunlight.
"Um... maybe I was thinking reeeeally hard about what I say before I speak in an attempt to become less flawed, for once? Did you ever think about that?" Sky says and puts a hand on their chest dramatically, a tiny glimpse of their milky chest feathers peeking out from the low collar of their dress and they brush them down in a fidgety manner.
Circe finally blinks out of her previous disorientation and her scarlet eyes snap towards Sky's chest feathers. She groans internally and her hands scrub over her face in attempts to re-focus herself. Circe sighs deeply, Sky shoots her a worried look.
"Yeeah that's my reasoning as well. I definitely wasn't distracted by uhhhh.... something." Circe responds a tad slower to the woodland-elf's question. Her eyes still drawn to Sky's chest feathers as they continue to fidget.
"Bullshit, liar." Sky murmurs under their breath, and Circe glares half-heartedly at them. Sky distracts themselves and starts singing a song that they were spontaneously reminded of after they process what they said. Circe's glare fades, she furrows her brows, then her sharp eyes narrow in recognition.
"Wait. Isn't that song about like... physical and mental abuse? And like, possibly, murder? Definitely demons?" Circe questions with deeply furrowed eyebrows.
"Yup! Sure is! Also, emotional abuse! You forgot that!" Sky chirps quickly and continues to sing, almost skipping ahead of the women out of the forest, Miranda begins to hum along happily and follows them.
"Alright." Circe responds with a shrug, her brows un-furrow, and she trails after them. Miranda stops suddenly and Circe almost bumps in to her. Circe frowns at her back. "What!? Why have we stopped?"
"We appear to be... in the wrong state." Miranda comments with some gravity, Sky's eyes widen and they gasp.
"Oh! Oh no." Sky breathes and Circe starts to laugh cruelly as she recognizes quickly what Miranda means and what the result of this problem would be, and that Sky definitely won't like it. "So....? That means....? What exactly? Wait! Fuck." Sky blurts in realization.
"We are going to have to teleport home." Miranda states as she only processes half of what Sky said. Sky heaves out a deeply resigned and exhausted sigh.
"Ugghh damn it!" Sky shouts, stomping one of their feet on the ground with an angry hand fluttering of their top set of hands, Circe laughs even harder at this outburst. Sky reels on Circe. "Is this schadenfreude?" Circe nods emphatically with laughter-tears in her eyes; Sky squints at her and crosses their top set of arms. "You bitch." Sky quips, deadpan. Circe barks out a laugh. "Did you know about this? Circe! I trusted you!"
"Well I AM a psychopath." The demon-angel claims with a clawed hand on her chest. Sky rolls their eyes with a small scoff and smile. Miranda lets out a soft snicker, her thin, curly tufted tail flicking behind her, barely lifting the bottom of her long skirt.
"Nah, you'd have to be charming for that! You're more of a sociopath." Sky states with a sly grin, tossing their hair back, and flounces away a little. They stumble slightly over their own taloned feet. Circe lets out a short titter at that. Sky turns back around in an attempt to recover, a sheepish smile on their face.
"Bet you thought you were cool with that... Hey! Wait a second! I am charming! Fuck you!" Circe realizes and rushes up to Sky indignantly, pointing a clawed finger at them. Sky gives her a closed-mouth smile and pats her head gently in a mocking-manner. Miranda lets out a soft laugh and shakes her head a little.
"Silly Circe! And probably, you are charming, yes. I guess." Sky says a tad frazzled and distracted, likely still upset with the anticipation of having to teleport soon, or maybe they're thinking about someone else who isn't here with them right now. "I mean you're charming enough to endear yourself to me!" Sky continues with a shrug dramatic enough to lift their wings slightly. "But, then again, I am easily impressed." They tack on with a grin at Circe.
"So cruel! And I thought you were supposed to be the nice one out of all of us!" Circe laments with false bravado and then hears her cellphone vibrate. Circe whips out her phone and cranes her neck over to look at an indecipherable, to Sky and Miranda, text message.
"I am nice!" Sky claims. Sky flaps their wings and they fly up a little, then they remember that they're wearing a dress and they probably shouldn't fly too far up, so they hover in place, almost hitting Circe in the head as they do this. They quickly fix the skirt of their dress and cross their legs at the ankles.
"Hey watch it!" Circe shouts testily, looking up from her phone to glower as Sky intentionally bumps her head with their left wing. All four of her eyes blazing a bit before softening when she looks longer at Sky's smirk.
"Oopsie daisy. My bad." Sky says with absolutely no remorse whatsoever and Sky lays down in the sky, their wings still flapping and their legs dangling. Sky's bottom set of hands laying flat on their abdomen, their middle set playing with their long hair, and their top set crossed behind their head. They start to hum an unfamiliar melody, likely one that they made up.
Miranda gives them both a subtly unimpressed look at this exchange, Circe sticks out her tongue and Sky chuckles with a beatific visage.
"...Circe?" Miranda begins to say, almost dreamily. Sky's head turns minutely towards Miranda as she speaks; Miranda looks over Circe's head.
"Yes my only true best friend as the other one is the worst?" Circe quickly responds with saccharine sweetness, peering up through her eyelashes at Miranda while pocketing her phone in her jeans again. Sky pouts with their top set of arms crossed at Circe's resentful statement.
"You.... might be... rubbing off on Sky." Miranda claims, matter-of-fact.
"Yeah, probably." Circe notes, slightly before Sky remarks nonchalantly: "She wishes she was rubbing off on me." Miranda lets out a choked laugh at that into one of her fists. Circe just chokes on her own saliva in response.
Sky calmly pulls water out of the air into their mouth, and drinks it, waiting for them to chill out while wearing a smug smirk. They then swirl another bit of air-moisture around one pointer finger.
"Excuse me?!" Circe yells, slightly embarrassed and quite flustered, at Sky in the sky. Circe fidgets with her fluffy snow leopard tail in her hands and smooths down the fur with one set of claws.
"You're excused." Sky retorts, lazily turning away from her. Circe splutters, frustrated, and also quite a bit interested in their banter. if she could keep her head on straight, yeah right, maybe she could continue it or at least respond in some way.
Why do I always want to hear more of their voice? Circe begs answers out of anyone who will listen to her in her mind. Another part of her mind responds:
They're a Siren, remember? Their voices are made to be craved. Circe shudders slightly at that and its implications.
But I'm not like that with Leslie? She attempts to reason. With herself.
You don't hate Sky. The other part of her says. She nods internally.
She takes a deep breath, struggles to remember what they were talking about before she had her internal panic/breakdown, then responds aloud:
"I treat you with kindness, and this is the sass I get in return?" She was hoping that Sky wouldn't acknowledge her delayed response. They appear not to notice, or they possibly were kind enough not to mention it. The latter is a tad more likely. Sky notices most things, they just don't know what to do with them.
"Oh no Circe! No one would ever deign to accuse you of being kind. No worries! Your cool, aloof persona remains intact." Sky chirrups with a sweet smile and Circe laughs, Miranda does too, just more quietly. "I did say quite a lot of no's in that last set of statements, huh?" They say it quietly as a sort of afterthought.
"Yup. Come down here.... we have to teleport if you would like to get home." Miranda commands with a vague hand wave towards the Siren. Sky sighs and flaps down towards the two women. The three of them, finally, exit the forest as Sky complains loudly and Circe laughs maliciously.