Gray was the current state of Leo. Dimmed cave lights had cast the environment into a silver-tinged twilight. The last drops of a torrential rain drizzled into the bay, the water a now swollen mass which threatened to overflow onto the beaches that touched it. They trickled through thick jungle vegetation with the gentle shushing sound of a lullaby, luring all who heard it to the cradling arms of sleep. Nestled between the previous raging downpour and the next, this was a period of peace before stormy weather resumed. Drying mud had yet to become once more a slippery slurry; land could be traversed safely for the time being without worry of becoming a filth-covered mess, at least if one's destination could be reached before another bout of precipitation crashed upon Gembound ears.

Of course, the ground could always be avoided entirely in favor of the air if you had the wings necessary to do so. And this Karambit did. A behemoth, it should have towered above the jungle canopy as it hovered along, its great leathery wings shedding droplets as they fluttered. With a passenger in tow, though, the monster's moist and unsightly back barely crested above the leaves. Swaying skeletal antennae extended farther, slicing through them with a distinctive rattle even while two pairs of deep magenta eyes peered downward at what a foremost set of claws hauled along.

"Heerrrrre! They'll like thiiisssss!"

Those drowsing due to the soft sheets of rain would find themselves roused quite suddenly by an assault of buzzing words blasting past them. Ever the exuberant sort, Karambit did not bother making a single attempt at privacy. Anyone, whether they wished to or not, could hear the one-sided conversation carried out in their vicinity. Who knew how long they might've listened. Who knew how quickly it might've taken for them to wish they'd overheard nothing at all.

"See theeeesssse." A spindly middle leg gestured at a plump spherical fruit dangling from a rather squat jungle tree. Claws plunged into its flesh and lifted it, juices streaming from stab marks, to face the skull Karambit had as a companion. "Verrry squishy! Ssssometimesss they'rrrree tough on the outssside. Then they pop! Like a frrriend's eyes without needing frrriend to give eyes! And leak prrrrettty colorsss."

Creosote's head, despite the numerous eyes sockets that pitted grimy bone, provided its usual input: stared in a way that could only be interpreted by the ignorant as uncomprehending.

Karambit groaned, the noise resounding throughout its entire body. "It'sss trrrrruuuue! Let mmmeeee find frrrriends. Then show!"

And once its sibling had been shown, it would gather as much as it could to impress its bestest of friends! Wherever they were, surely the wonderful display it was going to create would intrigue them enough to visit.

"Frrriends!" it screeched, enthusiasm conveyed via a painful siren pitch. "Frrriends! Wherrre are you? I neeeeddd help finding eyes!"

Who could resist answering such a dreadful racket? Plenty, no doubt. Talk about bursting open eyeballs tended to have that kind of alienating effect on the populace. But at least it'd tried.