Salvation was unfazed by Scorch's confusion and only nodded enthusiastically at their comment, even though there really wasn't anything to nod about. He was so wrapped up in his excitement that he didn't really notice the bird's hesitance. Besides, they had grown used to being asked the question before.

"We're all in here together! Me and Caliante and Rusty and Crack! And there's two others but we don't know them yet. It's one body, but there's four of us! We don't know how it works or anything, but we just switch off day to day who is in control. To make it fair. Although none of us really like it when Crack is in control." He trailed off and shuddered, but his excitement didn't die away at all.

But so excited was he and so wrapped up in his happiness that he didn't notice the darkness creeping in the back of his mind. Caliante tried to shout a warning, but she was muffled by the shadow that was invading the front. Crack's shock had worn off, replaced by anger, fury, and hatred for everything. It had failed to control its power. It hadn't brought any chaos at all. Only chaos to itself and those that lived with it.

Salvation opened his mouth to keep talking but froze as the spindly shadows wreathed around him and wrenched him from control. Yet again, the pose shifted. Instead of alert and excited, the eyes gleamed with malice and it stood tall and proud, eyes focused and glaring at Scorch. And when it spoke, its voice was deep, dark, smooth.

"And so they should be."

"Caliante." "Salvation." "Rusty." "Crack." "Tarragon." "Ripple."

@Scorch

Oh. So that was how it worked, more or less. Well, they all seemed nice enough, at least the two he'd met so far, and it would be so mean to judge them based on one little thing (even if it wasn't really little (was it? The bat itself was little, even though it was as big as Scorch, but Scorch was just a baby so it kind of made sense)), so he wouldn't! "Wow! That's so interesting. It must be nice having company all the time so you're never lonely. So nice to meet you, Salvation!" Briefly, he wondered how he was going to keep track of them all, but he quickly brushed away the concern. He'd just memorize their voices! It shouldn't be a problem!

And oh, how exciting! A new one came out to meet him! "Are you Crack?" Scorch guessed. "I mean, Salvation was just talking about you and now you seem to be referencing what he said, so I'm guessing you're Crack but if you're Rusty then I'm very sorry!" Then the rest of his mind caught up and tried to connect what Crack had said with Salvation's little speech. "You like them not liking you? But why? Isn't it much better to have people like you? Do you not like people much? Oh, I'm sorry if I'm overwhelming you with questions. I promise I didn't mean to." His ear tufts drooped; he hoped Crack wouldn't be mad at him for saying so much.

@Umbra

Crack narrowed its eyes at Scorch. It didn't care about this child. It was furious. Furious about its failure to keep the plague under control. And now they had lost three cycles and the body had been near death. That was unforgivable. Still, chaos flooded its mind. That's all it wanted, all it craved. Whatever the owl said was irrelevant. But perhaps it could start here. Have a bit of fun.

"I am what they call Crack." Its voice was cold and uncaring as it looked up and down the chick. It didn't need to use a full blown attack. Probably just a simple passing of the virus would do. Besides, the vector was dormant and weak, fought down by the chrysalis. An incubated bite wouldn't do much.

It continued to stare at Scorch, its eyes glittering. "Questions, questions. You ask questions because you want answers. I don't care who likes me and who doesn't. I don't care enough to like or dislike others. There is only one thing that matters to me." Crack reached down with his consciousness and grasped at the disease vector lying dormant in his gem. But as it tried to pull away enough to infect the owl, it resisted and it couldn't scrabble enough to cast a spell. It wasn't ready yet.

Instead, it glared at the owl as magic was sent pooling towards the disease. Hopefully, soon, it would be ready for a cast.

"Crack, no! You're going to infect us again!" Caliante's voice was desperate and pleading, but Crack paid it no head. It would not make the same mistake again.

"Caliante." "Salvation." "Rusty." "Crack." "Tarragon." "Ripple."

@Scorch

Scorch's ear tufts drooped even more as Crack glared and made its little speech. At least it wasn't mad at him, but it didn't like him either. Did he do something wrong? No, Crack said that it didn't care. What could be this thing, Scorch wondered, that Crack cared about so much? It must be very dedicated to abandon everything else in favor of that one thing. But still, that couldn't be healthy, could it?

"You must be so dedicated," he began. "But surely there's enough time now and then to take a break? There are so many beautiful things here." He didn't ask what the one thing Crack cared about was. He figured that if Crack didn't tell him, then he probably didn't want to talk about it too much. That was fine. He could respect that.

@Umbra

Crack was barely listening to the owl. It had better things on its mind. The first being that it could feel its control slipping. Whenever it had taken the body by force, it found that its powerful bursts of control were unable to be fended off, but terribly short. How was it supposed to spread chaos with such a weak grasp on the body? Perhaps this was fate's idea of a joke - make him ambitious and craving for chaos, perhaps even evil if it could be interpreted like that, but it did not have a body of its own. Instead sharing it with three others. No, five others.

But that wasn't important now. The magic it had been sending into the vector was starting to work wonders. It could feel the plague rolling around, the bacteria begging to be released into new blood. Not the body of Umbra again, no, its host would be the owl.

With a sudden movement, as fast and graceful as a bat could be, Crack lunched forward, teeth bared, aiming for Scorch's chest. The plague, surrounded by a layer of magic, had made its way into a bundle of saliva that Crack collected in its mouth. As soon as it was passed into the owl's bloodstream, the magic would fade and the plague would be free.

Spread pain...chaos...let the world be consumed.

"Caliante." "Salvation." "Rusty." "Crack." "Tarragon." "Ripple."

@Scorch

Suddenly, Crack lunged at Scorch, who thought it was attempting a hug until he saw its bared teeth. "AHHH!" he shrieked, jumping away and landing rather painfully on his back. "D-did you just try to bite me?" he asked in disbelief, hastily scrambling to his talons again and backing away. "Why would you do that? That's so mean!" He flapped his wings for emphasis, taking another step back. Maybe it didn't realize biting was bad? What did bats eat, anyway? Maybe if it hadn't bit anything before it didn't know how much damage teeth could do? That was all right, he could explain. "When someone gets bitten, it really hurts, and that's bad, so please don't do that again!"
@Umbra

Crack thought that the hit would land, but the owl managed to dodge out of the way. Of course, it should have known better. Immediately, it reinforced the magic surrounding the vector and landed, turning to face the owl again. It could feel the others starting to fight against it, feeling the end of its time in control. One more chance.

It wouldn't go for the same thing, no, that would be stupid. There was a better way to do this. It wouldn't be as strong, but it was better then nothing. Besides, it could feel the disease trying to fly out of control. It couldn't risk another infection.

It subtly surrounded a pocket of air in its mouth with magic and released the bubble around the saliva. The disease's bacteria spread to the air around and it released it towards the owl with a chuckle. "You're an idiot. Of course I know that. I know what I'm doing. But sure, I won't do it again, I promise." Its eyes glittered with malicious humor as it watched the owl, waiting so hungrily for them to breath in the plague.

"Caliante." "Salvation." "Rusty." "Crack." "Tarragon." "Ripple."

@Scorch

Scorch's face fell in confusion. If it knew what it was doing, why did it still try to bite him? But it promised not to try it again, so that was good, wasn't it? Still... "You knew you were going to hurt me if you succeeded? But why? Did I do something wrong?" Oh no. What had he done to offend the bat? Perhaps it was mad about him asking so many questions after all. Best not to ask more, then. He hastily clamped his beak shut, yellow eyes brimming with regret. He hadn't meant to make Crack angry. Maybe he should apologize. Would that help, or would it make it even madder?

Suddenly, there was a tickling sensation inside his chest. Confused, Scorch bent his head and tried to scratch it away with his beak, but it didn't work. Instead, the itchiness built up more and more until he was forced to open his beak and this weird sound came out. It was kind of like a sudden exhale, but more explosive. And it made the itchiness go away, except now he wanted to cough more. It occurred to him that Crack might not like him exhaling forcefully in its face, so he bent over and covered his face with a wing. There, that should work.

"I'm sorry," he said, after the coughing subsided. "I'm not sure what just happened. But whatever I did to make you mad, I'm sorry. Tell me what I did and I promise I won't do it ever again."

Crack gave a last, hateful grin as the other personalities wrenched it back again. Caliente shot forward and took control, the body of Umbra shifting yet again to its original stature. She looked up at Scorch with fear, realizing that Crack had managed to infect the young owl. "Scorch, oh no, I'm so sorry, it took control and we couldn't stop it! I'm sorry, I'm so sorry." Tears collected at the corner of her eyes as guilt washed over her and shook her to her core.

She wished that they had some magic that could reverse this, but Crack had forbidden the body to learn anything of the sort. Even if it had learned it, they had no way of reaching its magic. There was nothing they could do.

"You didn't do anything wrong," she cried. "Crack is evil to everyone else. All it wants is chaos! I don't know what to do about it. I thought it would have learned after we almost died..." Her words trailed off as she curled up, trying to control her self-pity and sobbing.

"Caliante." "Salvation." "Rusty." "Crack." "Tarragon." "Ripple."

@Scorch

Suddenly, Crack was gone, and Caliante was back again. Except this time she was crying and apologizing and saying some really confusing things. Like evil, for example. He had known, on some level, that if there was nice, there would also be an opposite of that. Like if there was real, there was fake. But he hadn't thought that anyone would actually be not nice, like he didn't expect to meet anyone fake, because if it existed, it had to be real.

But now Caliante was saying that yes, there was such a thing as evil, and that Crack was an evil being. And she was crying. Scorch was completely unprepared for this.

Still unaware that Crack had been the cause of his coughing earlier, Scorch approached the bat again. "Hey, uh, it's okay? I ... I'm not, like, blaming you or anything. Besides, Crack didn't manage to land the bite... I'm fine-" WHAT?! They'd almost DIED?! Oh no, that must have been terrifying. Awkwardly, he tried to put a wing around the bat in an attempt to comfort it. Maybe it would be a better idea to not talk for now? He didn't have any idea what to say anyways.

@Umbra