A(n Un)Familiar Problem

{Insert attempt at humor -here-}

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Well, you've more or less figured out what Pink is: A two-legger. Presumably the one with pink hair, given the colour of the weird glow that brought you here in the first place. Though blue or green are still very much on the table. It's one of the Two-leggers ahead, that much is pretty much a surety at this point, but they're all walking too close together- making noises at one another that you can only conclude to be some kind of communication -for you to discern which one you can magically perceive from absurdly far away for reasons you've currently yet to decipher.

Even with your money- whatever that is -on the one with the pink hair being the source of the near-identically hued glow though, you're not quite ready to call this little investigation of yours finished. Sure, you know next to nothing about the Two-leggers, so you're not sure what exactly following this group is likely to achieve. But…

Well, no but. You just fancy following them a bit longer.

You can feel Yellow moving in from behind you, though its pace seems to have begun to slow as it drew closer. It's certainly somewhere back there though, clearly intent on keeping pace, even if it doesn't seem intent on closing the distance for the moment. You spare a brief rearward look to see if you can spot the mysterious possibly-predatory and definitely pursuing yellow mystery glowing-thing. Nope. A new crowd seems to have left the building at some point, and whatever Yellow is, it's using them as cover. Or maybe it's part of the crowd, like Pink is with the one you're following?

Hmm. It makes no difference right now, still though, perhaps you should look into identifying yellow at some point. If nothing else it'll probably give some kind of insight into why Pink seems to be glowing. Yellow too, hopefully. Purple as well for that matter…

Wait- Purple!

You'd almost forgotten that one, or maybe you'd gotten used to it constantly disappearing and reappearing and stopped thinking about it too much. Either way, it had decided to do the latter and manifest again. Except, much closer than before. A quick glance reveals nothing though, it's simply not somewhere you can see, even if it's scarcely across the street. It is here though, somewhere, and seems to be doing just as much stalking as you. Who the stalk-ee is is another question you probably won't be finding a good answer for any time soon.



Things seemed to remain that way for a while: You stalking Pink's group, Yellow vaguely stalking you, and Purple Stalking… something, or someone.

Either way, Purple was clearly better at the shadowing, even before considering its inexplicable ability to randomly vanish and reappear at what seems to be whim, than Yellow. Unless you're mistaken, it's mostly sticking to the shadows, and occasionally popping into existence atop the shorter buildings when they're providing a good enough view without risking exposure. Either that or it's just constantly getting lucky and picking spots by chance that you can't quite make it out.

Then again if it's another Two-legger, well, you're a fair bit shorter than the ones you've seen so far. It might not be luck so much as just being tall enough to peer over the edge without making itself visible to something that's around half as tall as the average two-legger.

Yellow on the other hand is just following along, more or less, directly behind you.

Sure, it's hiding in a crowd. But there is no subtlety there, no attempts to avoid being spotted through camouflage and good positioning, just a lazy 'walk with these similar looking things so nothing spots me'. Granted you're not doing much of the subtlety yourself right now, just relying on your chameleonic abilities to avoid being spotted. But you have a pretty fair reason or two for that. Unlike you right now though, Yellow doesn't have the excuse of something, or possibly things, obviously pursuing it…

Well, whatever. The two loners seem to have split off at some point but the two groups of three still seem to be headed in the same direction. Which at the moment seems to be… a building of some kind: What a shock! Though you do have to wonder why the first words that come to mind when looking at it are 'Disco-mall'. Or, when you look at the roof that is. Why you feel like it's some kind of bad joke, and what a disco mall even is, are both questions you'll just have to throw on the rapidly growing pile of unsolved mysteries.

It was kind of generic not-rock base-building, topped by massive ball made up almost entirely of windows, which is a bit weird in your opinion. Here's hoping you don't end up getting bored enough to count them all. You'd probably have to spend- read: waste -the better part of a day doing it. You can't even fathom how bored you'd need to be to consider that fun enough to actually consider doing.

The group you'd been following seemed to slow, and eventually stop as you got nearer to the ball-like building. They made noises at one another for a few moments before splitting off in different directions.

Pink and Blue both seemed to be walking towards the building- Purple apparently following them -while green, uh, didn't. Instead following the street… perpendicular? Was that the word? Whatever. There was a street that seemed to loop around the disco-mall in a rough circle and green was following it.

You couldn't place your finger on precisely why, but you felt it to follow her rather than the other two.

It was rather busy here, crowded. Mostly smaller specimens, roughly green's height. Though there were a few of the taller ones visible here and there. Following green on the ground would have been tough, though not undoable, but fortunately wasn't necessary. After all, you were a spider: half-climbing a building and walking along the wall was a pretty easy, not to mention obvious, solution. Especially given that the Two-leggers didn't seem to have any such climbing ability. You're pretty sure how proud of yourself you're feeling for remember you did have that ability probably doesn't say good things about you though.

By your reckoning you'd gone about a quarter of the way around the weird ball-building before green seemed to find what she, and you're pretty sure green was a 'she', had been looking for: another building. One with tables and chairs in front of it. She headed inside for a few moments, though what she did in there was something you couldn't quite see from your vantage point, before coming back out and apparently claiming one of the tables for herself and pulling... something, out of her bag and staring at it, and occasionally prodding it too, all the while seemingly trying to ignore the world around her.



…



This is going to get boring quickly, isn't it?

A strong shudder and a very familiar feeling of unease quickly puts that thought on hold: Replaced by the unnerving understanding that Drills was here. Somewhere. Somewhere close. Nowhere you could see her of course, no matter how hard you searched the area. But you know she's here, and close, and you get the feeling she knows you're here too.

And suddenly the idea of being bored seems so much more attractive.

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[] Ignore Drills, continue watching green.

[] Head into the Disco-mall to...
-[] Hide
-[] Look for Pink
-[] Look for Purple
-[] Write in?

[] React to Drills...
-[] Run away!
-[] Hide somewhere nearby!
-[] Stay VERY still and hope she doesn't see you.
-[] Turn the tables: hunt her.
-[] Write in?

[] Do something else.
-[] Write in?

This... was certainly not the play I was expecting when I wrote the last chapter.

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Now, you have to admit that you're no stranger to impulsive decisions, that's kinda why you're here right now, but deciding to try and hide from Drills under a table? That's a new level of impulsive. Sure, you hid from her in the past by pretending to be a rock, but you didn't really have any better options back then. Here? A hundred directions to run, dozens of places to hide, and she didn't even know where you were yet…

So naturally, you hide under the nearest table. Well, nearest to Green anyways.

It's a little awkward: you're a bit too big to really be 'under' the table per say, both in terms of being too tall and too wide: You'd rocked the table a bit when you'd scrambled under, eliciting a startled noise best described as 'Eh?' from Green in the process. You were having to lay on the ground right now just to stop the table tipping too much, as in: visible from a distance, and even having curled up as best you can your legs are still sticking out a bit. Along with a good chunk of your abdomen. And one of your hair-tufts too… Really, what were you thinking here? The table was barely big enough for the chairs to slide under, much less you.

Stupid middle-table-pole-thing, making a hard job even harder.

…

It's really uncomfortable down here. Dirty too, for that matter. And sticky. Seriously, what your plan here?

The feeling of creeping dread returned once more, no doubt meaning that Drills is headed your way again. Yellow too for that matter: it seems to have abandoned discreet stalking for the moment in favour of walking almost directly towards you.

Too bad that all you can see from your questionable hiding place is a couple of empty tables and up Green's skirt, otherwise you'd finally get to see what Yellow looks like. It's currently right behind you after all, no way of hiding. But no, you couldn't possibly turn to look now without almost flipping the table or kicking the chairs, again. Yellow seemed to linger there for a brief moment, before moving away into the building, probably. Maybe. You don't exactly have eyes in the back of your head to see for sure. And even if you did your abdomen would be in the way, which come to think of it probably explains why you don't have eyes there. You really can't say where yellow is going, what with not being able to see through your own legs and abdomen, but you're just going to assume it went into the building. More because you can't think of anywhere else it could have gone.

Well, whatever. You're now under a small table, Drills and Yellow are both here nearby, Green seems to be slightly unsettled by how the table had jumped up- if only for a moment -for no visible reason and the two empty chairs sliding backwards in equally inexplicable fashion… Yeah. She Hasn't really moved, yet, but she does seem to be a little spooked.

On the side that is neither bright nor dark, you can safely say that Green isn't the source of the pink glow.

Well, you're hidden sort-of-under a table now. You're not really sure if that's an improvement over hanging off a wall. In fact you'd wager that if Drills was watching she probably knows exactly where you are now. Though the fact she's both close and hasn't attacked despite your less than covert dart into cover meant it was working, hopefully. Maybe Drills is scared of massed two-leggers too? You can't exactly recall seeing her anywhere the Two-legger frequent. Though given you've only really seen her, what, three times? Two of those in your Two-legger free home? That probably doesn't indicate all that much.

Oh, and another one of those white things seems to be looking at you from under an adjacent table.

Not one of the big, feathered ones, the smaller ones you'd only caught glimpses of the first time you were trying to put distance between you and Drills in this strange world. Though getting a better look at it now, you should probably call it white and pink. You're also a bit curious as to why it seems to have two sets of ears, or ear-looking things, but that's another question for 'not in mortal peril' time.

It can see you. That was something you were very much sure of, what with the fact that you were currently locked in a staring contest with it, though given that you don't need to blink you're feeling pretty confident who'll win this one… assuming that it doesn't share that lack of need, of course. There's something very weird about those pink, almost doll-like, eyes though. Something very weird-

A two legger walks between you and… Ears? Yeah, you're calling it Ears now. -walks between you and Ears on its way to a table. Its legs only blocked your view for a fraction second, but that was clearly long enough for Ears to pull a perfect disappearing act and vanish without a trace.

It was a neat trick to be sure. Now if only you could do that, then you wouldn't be stuck in this mess…

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[] Continue hiding under the table.

[] Look for a better hiding spot.
-[] On a nearby rooftop.
-[] in the Disco-mall.

[] Run away!

[] Do something else.
-[] Write in?