ORIGIN - Thou Scream Also Weep, Stuck in Time

Sniffles took to exploring- though they were a young being, they were able to move and travel just fine. So, they did. Every time they came across a challenge, they would try to obviate it, however, their most current challenge could not be prevented so easily. Curiosity struck at the tree that was in front of them, figures screaming in horror stuck in time forever how long the thing had been there.

It was scary, but not so scary that Sniffles didn't want to interact with it. The strange roots only made the slithering creature more curious. Would the roots make a sound if Sniffles made the same expression? Could they yell, scream, and cry like other creatures of the caves? ...Was the tree even a tree?

All questions on the young one's mind as they circled it, clawing at one of the roots with the legs on their body. Tongue flicking, only to gag at the smell coming from their own body. gross went through their mind as the goo exited the pits of their body.

Maybe one of those things was testable.

Lifting their head, the snake opened their mouth.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA" In a scream to see if the tree would do the same.

After her encounter with ~~Mother~~ ~~Blackberry~~ Nameless, Jayberry had taken to wandering.

She couldn't return to the Collector, of course, and neither to Nettleberry, nor could she go to Hydra as she initially planned. So she wandered, and found herself in the swamps of Cetus.

Where she had found her pups gemstones. Poor Nettleberry's, poor, poor Shimmerberry's, and Agony's, and she prayed that he was safe and happy wherever he was, though she hadn't smelled him, nor seen hide nor hair of them, and perhaps that was for the best, he had despised her in the end.

And then - "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA", she startled, turned her head and raised it to the air, sniffed but all she could smell is much, so followed the noise.

And perhaps it wasn't the muck she'd been smelling, but the creature itself, as it oozed and looked of tar, but also seemed young. So, slipping out of the mist, hoping not to scare it, she called out, "Are you... well?" 'Be better, be good, be something to be proud of,' "Why are you screaming?"

@Sniffles

The slithering creature shaped like a snake, but with legs, stopped the yelling when the tree didn't scream back. What was the point of the strange screaming shapes if they didn't make a sound? It almost disappointed the being. Huffing out, they turned when there was another voice.

Oh! How an interesting looking thing! Claws and horns and all the good stuff, making the creature look so cool.

"Ey!" The dark creature called out. When she asked what was wrong, well, Sniffles took one of their legs and pointed at the screaming figures that were made of the plant's roots.

"It not make noise."

@Jayberry

What a... strange creature. It wouldn't look out of place among her family, and a twinge ran through her chest, her family's ghosts running through her mind--perhaps not a moosegoose, not blood, but someone her Mother, when she'd been Blackberry, been Mother, not the white pristine goose named Nameless, would bring back home and declare family.

She shook her head, discarding the thought as she would water trapped in her fur, "Hello," there, saying hello was polite, wasn't it? She was trying!

Although, perhaps, her blank 'how stupid are you?' stare was less so. She reached up, cupping her muzzle with a humanoid paw and running it down her face like a human would facepalm, "N-no, it does not. Trees, plants, they don't make noises."

'At least, not normally. Set them aflame, though...'
Again, she shook her head, discarding the thought. Bad Jayberry.

"Gembound make noises. Greaters talk, Lessers... don't."

@Sniffles

Sniffles didn't really understand what the wolfish creature meant. But the tree was screaming! Wasn't she able to see? Didn't the strange wolf see that the roots of the tree were screaming? No sound came out, but they were most definitely in a permanent scream. Was the tree in pain? Could a tree that size be in pain? Could a tree be in pain at all?

"but it yell!" The snake replied, goop spilling out of the pits of the creature as its head went side to side.

@Jayberry

She looked from snake to tree to snake.

Looked at the tree.

Looked at the snake.

Looked at the tree.

Looked at the snake again.

'Why?' she thought mournfully, 'Why is the first Gembound I try to be polite to an idiot?' Jayberry did not have the patience for this.

"It. Just looks like it's yelling. It's just a very unfortunately looking tree. See?" she split her face in a yell, a yell she very much wanted to let out but if she did that she would actually yell and a yell would turn into a snarl and then a bear-trap snap and mauling was not polite and then Mother wouldn't want her back.

Licking her lips, she shook her head. "I looked like I was yelling, but I was not yelling."

@Sniffles

Sniffles watched the wolf move to open her mouth and act like she was yelling. It was a yell! Very much a yell. They huffed to themselves. It was a silent yell, but the wolf with horns and strange legs was yelling. Sniffles didn't understand what the creature meant. Yes, she yelled. A very quiet one. Sniffles could do that too.

"You yell." They replied.

Sniffles slithered closer to the wolf to try and poke her with their claws.

"Quiet yell. But yell."

@Jayberry

Cetus had, during the two Gembounds' exchange, settled into an unsettling, hushed silence. Perhaps they would notice, or not; but the ever-present shrieking of the Hallowed Callers, the constant hum and buzz of the swamp, had stilled.

It had begun with Sniffles' claws raking over the great tree's roots.

And now came a sound: not unlike a scream, the rushing torrent of rustling branches and leaves scraping and screeching off one another, all around, all overhead, a horrific nails-on-blackboard sound. When it stilled, it left silence in its wake.

@Sniffles @Jayberry

Jayberry stared into the void.

This creature was testing her patience, and she very much wanted to bite-maul-kill-tear. And Sniffles one saving grace was that it smelled like death and rot and wrong.

"I..." she started, 'don't really know what to say now. -think you're the biggest idiot in the Caves? Kind of want to see what would happen if I smacked you into a tree? See if you'd go 'splat' or 'smack'?' Instead, she gave a slow blink, and a grin that showed a few too many teeth. "am... yelling. Yes. Silently."

Her ears twitched, and she looked around--something was wrong, she hadn't survived so long by being a fool. It was quiet, she realized suddenly, too quiet, and her hackles stood on end, moments before there was a horrific noise, one that had her cowering, crouching and snarling.

@Sniffles

The swamp grew quiet, but that was the last thing on the snakes mind. They didn't get why it was so hard for the wolf to understand that the tree was indeed yelling. And just as the snake opened their jaws to yell again, the tree did it for them.

"IT YELL!" the snake yelled

And then they shrieked trying to match the trees sound

@Jayberry