Catch the Runaway! (Open)

So this was where she'd gone!

Sydney stood outside the stables, gazing at a mare with strawberry blonde fur and a silky, well-brushed mane. With her sunglasses on, she could just barely tell that this was her older brother's horse. Through the dull red glow of her body heat, she could recognize her familiar form anywhere, having attended her brother's competitions ever since she was little. Atsila was about as normal a horse as you could get, average height, build, and temperament, but ever since Rhett had broken his leg riding her at night a few months ago, she was very undertrained. 'I should do something nice for him.' He'd been rather down lately, and she had no clue as to why, but maybe this could help cheer him up. She had no clue that what was causing his downward spiral was far deeper. But she tried anyway.

The Summer girl took a lead and looped it around the mare's nose, gently leading her out towards the exercise ring. She had her thick, heat-resistant gloves on, so she thought it was fine, but when she moved to pat the horse of the neck she was surprised to hear Atsila whinny with pain, along with the smell of burnt hair. When she reared Sydney was thrown backwards into the grass, and the horse took off towards the scorched woods, kicking up ash and disappearing in a cloud of dust. In the moment she started to race after her, but once her body started to heat up her eyes began to burn and water profusely. Her own body was too hot to look at! Maybe that was why she didn't notice someone else nearby.

Wow


As much as she enjoyed her habbit of spying on people, particulary because others' lives seemed more interesting to observe than her own, she had, at least once in a while, the thought that those people were actually brainless automatons. She had watched that girl and her horse from the cover of a fence, not much of a cover, her being seated on the wooden planks. But when she witnessed the what she considered lame failure, the escape of the horse, she thought she should help. That girl needed suppory, pety humanly emotions.

Jocellyn ran the field until she reached the girl, and stood looming over her, a squint in her left eye calling the girl up. A person would have given the brunette on the grass and encouraging chit-chat, but the sonic voicedngirl was no sort of talkative, not now and obvously not ever. She turned her head to gaze towards the vanishing horse, the dark-green canopy swallowing it's shape.

A few moments passed before the dull undulating light of her pulse lessened and the glow no longer impaired her sight. Rubbing her eyes, she soon spotted the culprit for her misfortune: a small hole at the fingertip of her glove. She was about to mutter something to herself when the faint heat of another living thing caught her attention, the vague shape of a human. Before she turned to look at them directly, she pushed up her sunglasses so as not to blind herself. Again. 'How can people be so hot?'

...'Never say that out loud. Sounds stupid.' Sydney turned to face the humanoid shape, trying once more for what seemed like the hundredth time to determine any bit of general information about who stood before her, but of course she couldn't bring herself to look down to check for whatever they had down there. So she had nothing to go on. Just another generic heat signature with a calmly beating heart, indistinguishable from the dozens she walked past every day. But before she even bothered to take in the tiny differences and get to know who this was, she had to find this horse. She swallowed her embarrassment to ask something of the stranger.

"Did you- Do you see a horse running around somewhere? I need to find her." She waved a hand in front of her face, hoping to show her inability to see the mare from such a distance, but the sudden appearance of heat in front of her eyes made them water again. For a moment she had the idea if she could get hot enough to make them boil. Not a good idea, but it was an idea.

Jocellyn arched an eyebrow at the way the girl waved her hand in front of her eyes the let out tears. She shrugged it off casually, pretending she knew what the burnette meant by that, then whippednher bead around, pointing at the direction the horse went, or at least tried to pinpoint the possible way through a canopy of same looking trees.

Once again, the girl turned to look at the second girl, qondering how much would it takemfor her to finally get up so she could get going to her own bussiness. But gosh, did she seem like someone to make a scene out of it. Casually setting the volume of her heafphones to a lower level, aware that she'll have to listen to the brunette talking while she really had to point and make her understand.

When the person only responded with a point, the blue-eyed girl squinted at the forest to try and make out any sort of warmth. No luck. Pushing herself off of the ground, she got to her feet in a single, fluid motion that minimally increased her body heat. She pushed up her sunglasses again out of habit.

This lack of audio stimulus was setting her on edge, seeing the inner workings of someone didn't help if you couldn't determine their facial expressions, distinguish one color from another, or even read. What was she supposed to do in a situation like this? Recognizing a voice was what she relied on whenever her eyes got stuck like this. Things like this happening always sat the back of her mind; her trying to converse with someone at this school who couldn't speak! She was starting to get restless. This was awful. "..Thanks." She took a step towards the trees, feeling the hole in her glove with her thumb. "Let me know if you do see her. Doesn't matter how, alright?" She was not about to let this go. She was going to find out who this person was and have a better conversation - if this could even be called that - once her eyes returned to normal. Then she started to head towards the woods again, occasionally peering out from under her glasses to get a better look at what was ahead.

Jocellyn took a step back in the grass to give the girl space to get up. She wasn't very excited of this task of catching the horse, butndang, if she could back down whenever she wanted, she'd be blessed. So the mute began following the other girl with a jumpy pace, looking around with her brown eyes for the blonde horse they were after. Soon, the two were swallowed by the forest, the sky growing in a shade of orange-blue. The tips of the trees were turning pitch black in the sunset light. The blonde swallowed drily. We are so going to stay here through the night. she told herself, feeling the hair on the back of her neck rise preventively.

A few more minutes passed and the girls were not getting anything out of that. Just endless walking, and now the field were only a peeking orange behind them, growing fainer and fainter with each step. Jocellyn stopped, stomping her foot to catch the attention of the other girl.

W-A-I-T-C-O-V-E-R-Y-O-U-R-E-A-R-S she spelled into the palm she was now gripping tightly by he wrist, and when she believed her point was made, she started untying her bandages from her mouth.

Every now and then while they searched for the horse there was a flash of warmth, but each time it was just a wild animal. Once the world began to cool Sydney started to relax. With the sun dipping in the sky she wouldn't need her sunglasses for much longer, as the blazing heat of the star wouldn't be scorching her corneas. 'Do baby snakes teach themselves how to do this or is it just natural?' She'd have to find a kid who could talk to animals, there was bound to be someone like that at this school. Maybe she'd ask someone her brother mentioned once, a boy named Louis who had only graduated this year, and was assumed to be living in Rosebury. Yes, she'd ask him.

By this time she'd gotten used to the grip on her wrist, but she was still alarmed when the person began writing on her hand, wondering if she would burn them even through the glove. The first word evaded her due to her surprise, although the last three, C-O-V-E-R-Y-O-U-R-E-A-R-S, came through clearly. She did so, reasonably a bit confused, and watched as warm strips of fabric came away from the person's mouth. What were they going to do?

The warm bandages fell, revealing pale and delicate skin around her mouth, white was quite normal, nothing to hide about it, at least not in plain sight. Turning to look over her shoulder at the brunette, she frowned. Doesn't she ever move faster? So Jocellyn caught the girl's warm wrists again and slapped her palms over her ears, suhtting them from the quiet noises of the forest. That shluld do, and if it left her stunned, of well. She could locate that horse, and she could've located it the old fashioned way, but this way, it was easier.

Turning the volume of her headphones to max, Jocellyn closed her eyes sttongly, as if bracing for something, then poened her mouth and spoke for the first time at the academy. "Jocellyn." she would've said, but the spund that came out of her mouth was as high pitched as the screech of an eagle, but more profound. A sonic wave. She could sense the wave going in the same template of trees and small critters, until somewhere, not too far away, it hit a larger shape and bounced back.

Opening her eyes, she saw certain small cuts it the first few trees around them, as if the sonic scream had been to powerful it had cut the first few obstacles, but luckily, there was no destruction. She picked up the bandage she had stuffed in her pocket, tying it around her  outh, welcoming the familiarity of it around her neck.