Something about that voice changed. Her ears tilted backward as the sound of wings entered the air and she yelped in surprised as clawed feet perched upon her shoulders. She stepped forward, then heard it. The painful familiarity of that voice rang inside her head and bounced off her skull like an echo among cave walls. No, life was certainly not fair, and as Dia buried her disastrous beak into Penelope's flesh, she released a blood curdling scream.

Penelope bolted, no longer giving a damn about where she was going or what she would run into. Her long legs carried her heavy body with ease... at first. Then something became amiss. A back leg suddenly gave way, leaving her with three legs. Her other hind leg fell from under her as well, which caused her forelegs to twist under her as she flew toward the ground like a train that lost it's wheels. A trail of dust remained in the air behind her after her skid came to a halt.

"No, no, NO!" She cried out and began to lift herself up, only to immediately collapse. Something was wrong. Something was so horribly fucking wrong. Little by little, her body became a useless heap of meat. She squirmed in the final moments of her strength, a whimper being the finishing touch as her head collapsed to the ground, her entire body now paralyzed. Blinking didn't even seem possible, her breath felt hitched. The only untampered muscle was her heart, which raced with fear and adrenaline.

Tears rolled uncontrollably from her eyes as she stared into the abyss of her blindness. Voice now gone, unable to call for help, unable to plead for mercy. She couldn't even properly sob or shiver as every single ounce of her felt the fear and pain. Her body was a prison. This had been a trap, and she was certain she would never trust again, especially not birds. For now, though, she had bigger things to worry about, like... Oh gods, gods... what is she going to do to me?

- - -

"Speech"
@Dianysma

As she drove her beak into the cut, blood already began to spurt about her face, painting her pale feathers crimson, dark as her bright red eyes. Feeling the tapir bolt and move quickly, the raven flapped her wings and followed with a malicious hunger surging through her. It was only a matter of time before she became too weak to resist the fall. Surely enough, it succeeded. Flopped on her side and breathing quickly, Penelope was weakened. But she'd feel all of the pain that she was about to inflict upon her, about to destroy her with.

"You're so naïve, fooled by the same vile creature twice," she cooed as she perched upon the shoulder of the fallen tapir, claws tempted to sink into the skin of the clubfooted beast. "Why is that, I wonder. You place your trust in the first Gembound to call themselves a friend, dear." Pastel beak shifted into a cruel grin as she grazed the tip across the curves of the tapir's shoulders. "Why don't you ever learn?" Suddenly, she jabbed her beak into flesh, splashing herself with blood once again. She reveled in it, and she waited for the silent gasping and wheezing before she slowly and painfully drew it out.

@Penelope

Words from the pale bird cut into her before her beak ever did. Penelope felt stupid and, in fact, was positively certain she was the truest moron to be found in these caves. Learn... she would learn from this if she survived it. Of course, she was certain Dia was only planning to kill her in the most agonizing way possible, feeling her idea of it solidify as the beak penetrated her skin and entered her flesh.

Breathing grew weaker as her need to scream rushed into her mind. Nausea settled in her gut, but not a muscle in her body would be able to force it up, so instead, it seemed to slowly trickle into her esophagus in preparation for that moment. More tears filled her eyes and soaked her face, ground below it growing into a spot of mud, which would surely be bigger by the end of this.

The feeling of warm blood splashing over her own skin was horrifying, as if the pain just wasn't enough. Penelope wanted to scream out so badly, but instead, was only able to in her mind. Louie... Louie! Gods, ow, please. She's killing me... SHE'S KILLING ME! She hoped that, somehow, Louie would hear her and... oh, but who was she kidding? He said it himself; you can't trust anyone, and she couldn't even find it in her heart to believe Merry Men would ever help her, now.

- - -

"Speech"
@Dianysma | @Louie via link (do not have him intervene just yet, but reaction post is a-ok)

---

Things had been working out well. All the life that he had lost in his months in these tubular caverns had almost been stored to be forced back into him again when he was within his chrysalis. Perhaps he should adopt that as a cleansing strategy? Destroy his body till he was nothing more than a limp vessel and let his gemstone work to regenerate. Truthfully, he wasn't sure how many more times he had that supposed ability. It wasn't something he had seen more than once or twice in his lifetime.

Today was no different to every other day, he tracked back through the familiar tunnels as he thought about what was the next step in his grand plan. Too many creatures were becoming aware of his skills too quickly. Yes, he wanted his name spoken in whispers. To become the feared, through his dangerous methods. Not through blatantly honking on about how herbivores were better than carnivores like Hasira did. No, Hasira had been stupid. Louie wouldn't let his name be tarnished like that.

On the fishing wire that connected him to Penelope, a state that it seemed to take during periods of lull, he could begin to feel fervent tugging on the opposite end of it. The fox frowned and began to slow his pace, the sweet sickly smell of iron was beginning to fill the tunnel and his ears flattened. Not losing pace, he just continued to walk slowly keeping his pace even. Opting instead to take the high road as he had the day he'd thrown Wynry to his death. Pressed up against the wall, despite use of both eyes, he flattened his body to the ground.

Quietly, he coughed under his breath as he felt the thick gelatinous goo enter his mouth. Hastily, he spat it all over the ground in front of him, backing up a few steps so that he was no longer in view of the scene. A streak of the sticky tar lay in front of him so he couldn't move back. But he had seen what he needed, and as he opted instead to look through the eyes of the dismal tapir, he waited.

Feeling the stiff muscles twitch beneath her talons as she inflicted pain and misery upon the pathetically weak tapir filled the pastel raven with sheer joy. It was a sick kind of joy, shadows who had gripped her mind with spindly fingers and twisted it into a grotesque thing. If once were to ever gaze into the aura and energy of the monster, they would discover nothing but darkness and disease. Plague and shadow. Beak cracked in a malicious grin, the raven slowly made her way down the tapir's body before ending upon the floor. But she made her presence still known, subtly rubbing her wings on the sickly warm skin of the clubfooted beast.

"I wonder how you'd look with a bleeding heart like mine," she whispered wickedly, lyrics spilling like dark shadows from her beak, and she grazed the tip of it upon the creature's jugular. "But of course, you already have one. You wear it upon your shoulder. How foolish you are to do so." Dianysma had not noticed the presence of another prokaryotic being in the room, let alone one that was observing through the Tapir's blindness.

"Let's see how you look with your entrails decorating this tunnel. It will complement the many faces carved and painted in their own blood well, if I say so myself." With the end of that small monologue, she tugged at her magicka and hoped to make the creature even more unwell, to bring full-out tears to Penelope's eyes and make her choke on the breath that she did not have. But alas, it was a failure. No matter. This would not hinder her efforts. Smirking viciously, the raven buried her beak deep into the neck area of the tapir.

@Penelope

---

What a cocky... Louie could hear what was being spoken despite not being able to see it, and he growled slightly. This wasn't the megalomaniac he aspired to be and he certainly couldn't understand the obsession with causing pain unto others so needlessly. Penelope was a naive and misguided child, but she deserved no ill harm onto her. There was no concern for the tapir though, he couldn't care less. It was just the blatant disregard for one to honour their craft. To become so self-obsessed and consumed by this idea of power that they would desecrate the path to achieve it.

Fool.

Due to his lack of concentration on his own workings of magic, he began with a shaky start to sifting out the sand and compressing it into the tiny diamond shapes that would serve as his knives in order to slice apart the feathered one. Tainted by his bile, the virus didn't require a big portion in order to be infectious. To be cut by one, was to ascertain sickness. Combining the two had been something he had merely invented on the spot, but it meant he was more likely to his target. With only the mild control, they picked up and began circling around him as they couldn't be directed so specifically at a target. Kept at bay by the inner workings of his gemstone, he jumped down from the ledge straight into the fray. Perhaps Penelope would be cut, but he also knew the exact remedy.

Louie wouldn't waste his breath on the oxygen stealer. Instead he just stared down Dia and advanced towards her, his shards flying wildly around his body and narrowly missing cutting his own paws. It forced him to stop moving, and instead he expanded the circle from where he was stationery.

---

Round 1 of ??
Attacks: Shard Storm directed at both Dia/Penelope since it's supposed to be a tornado he can't really direct what it does. It's spiralling around his own body so he is unaffected by it.
Defenses: Having the Shard Storm tornado of death
Injuries: Absolutely none

As she continued to make the tapir wordlessly screech, she felt a nagging sense that she should stop and leave whilst she had the chance. A low whine filled the air as the winds in the tunnel were shifted, sand being compressed together into shards of sharp and deadly glass. Red eyes whirled about to see a much larger creature approaching, half of its face torn off. Regardless, it stared with a dark gaze. It was not even comperable to the hollowed gaze of her god, but it still... alarmed her. Made her shake. She extended her wings, ripping her beak from the tapir's flesh and attempting to make use of her new ability to fly...

...but she fell short, her wings caught on the swirling shards of glass. She screeched. It burned. Each piece of the shard storm sliced into her skin, then quickly retreating to rejoin the storm. The pastel raven quickly became stained crimson with her own blood, deep cuts oozing dark liquid with every passing second. No. Nonono, this wasn't supposed to happen. Dianysma fell with a wet THUMP! and she began to scramble away, eyes gazing about wildly to find a place that she could just hide. A place that she could get away from this place. Somewhere in the back of her head, a voice hissed. It was her own thoughts. 'You're too weak to stand up to the first sensation of pain you feel.' The world spun about her, darkness creeping on the edges of her vision. She wasn't even aware of the disease that she had been infected with and would soon be crippled by.

She felt like she was going to throw up.

1 of ???

attempting escape from the shard storm - failed
probably bleeding out and is infected with a ton of botulism vomit

@Louie

Agony. Endless, impenetrable agony. Her neck ached with the rest of her, blood initially spurting from the newest wound as Dia pulled away. Little did she know, Louie was there. Her brain was in a haze, drifting in and out on consciousness. As Dia seemed to suddenly scramble about, sharp stinging singed her skin, but was nothing compared to the large pale beak of the retreating corvid. The screeching snapped her awake, long enough to smell the bird's blood as it ran from her.

Then it all fell into silence again, her mind slipping away for the remainder of the battle between fox and bird.

- - -

"Speech"

OOC: She'll come back just as Louie finishes doing what he doin'
@Louie | @Dianysma