Frozen Poultry on Aisle 2 [Nameless and Genzo]

Almost in response to his thoughts, Eve stopped and looked at the situation. There was a hesitation on her face as she tried to throw kindling under the monster. That fucking gross thing was either going to start moving or snap off its web when it caught fire. Her thoughts were also a little too late, as they allowed the fire to grow the spider became restless.

Breaking from the web and putting its legs prone to pounce, the Skulltula dropped to the floor. Eve threw her ridiculous Desenium hammer in a panic. Yelling "DESCEND" the weapon spun to its large head facing downward and the magic flashing a fancy washed out triangle behind the little marble bust on its other end. The hammer plummeted midair and pinned the monster down by its center of mass. She didn't try that before it seemed but the creature being horizonal helped a lot. At least for pulling that maneuver off.

Then, a thought came to her before she could start blathering again. What if she just. . . kept commanding the hammer? "ASCEND!" "DESCEND!" she started belting out. It went up . . . then down . . . the spider looked very harmed by this fact.

"ASCEND DESCEND ASCEND DESCEND ASCEND DESCEND" she started yelling. A weird unfamiliar cruelty started to bleed into her voice.

The weird expressive face on the hammer's head looked back at them, almost as if it knew what it was doing. Gasping for air, Eve stopped shouting. The spider was twitching and almost entirely deformed from the repetitive impacts. At this moment, the fire that was next to it started to spread and the corpse smelled awful as it quickly caught fire. Eve made sure to wait until it was safe to retrieve her weapon. Her cocked eye caught Ruairi, who had just stood witness to this madness.

"Yeh Chicky that's howeedoo." she acknowledged, hoping the pathway through the next opening wasn't swarming with these.

"Aww no it can't be that bad Chicky." Eve cheekily responded, ducking under the archway after pocketing her hammer.

Stepping once into the dark, at least three Skullwalltulas dropped and landed on the weird girl. Evelyn fell into a ball on the floor and was instantly covered in large bites. Writhing in pain, she hoped Ruairi was following her because she didn't really have a backup for this situation. Her dagger gleamed in the dark, she tried to jab all around her but she was missing most of her swings. Rolling over in agony she noticed the spiders raggedly backing off.

"CHICKY AH THE SPIDER." she roared, rolling over and looking at what happened.

It seemed the various poisons rushing through her blood were especially lethal to smaller creatures. The leggy little beasts curled onto their backs and their legs started to shrivel inward. Still covered in wounds, Eve forcibly tried to hold back tears as she pushed herself to her feet.

"N-no. We're getting a t-torch and we can go in slowly. I won't let you get hurt Chicky." she announced, going back to search the sconces for torchs.

She re-appeared moments later, and she was visibly dripping blood in certain places. This girl didn't seem to be the type to ever bring a healer, either. The closest she could muster was drawing out her Ghastly doll from her Adventure pouch. The little strange looking nostalgic doll circled her torso carrying a little coil of bandage. It worked like a little spider-monkey climbing around and wrapping the bandages. This kept Eve's hands free as she handed a usable torch over to Ruairi. She flinched a bit as the doll tightened gauze onto her wounds.

"You act like you've never seen a possessed doll before." Eve said nonchalantly between cringing from her wounds.

Its weird button eyes locked onto Ruairi. Whether Eve was controlling it or not, damn that thing was creepy. Its tiny people-clothes were kind of cute though. The yarn-based cretin crawled like a bug down its master and back into the fashion-worthy Adventure Pouch's pocket.

"It does a lot more than just that though. I usually don't have to use it at-all." she added, getting a handle on her stride into the tunnels.

There was an increase in pipes coming out of the walls and various aquafer features built into the environment. Just as they seemed to be getting somewhere, Eve tripped on something they weren't able to see. Falling pathetically again, it seemed she had collided with something solid. The unseen object lay there, ephemerally waiting to be touched. Looking up to Ruairi's torch, then back down again, Eve really didn't see anything. She clutched her shin which now hurt like the rest of her body. Her teeth clamped down on her lower lip as she pouted. This was just like the thing with the jellyfish things in the Dark Palace all over again. It was no use crying for help. She just sat there looking up at her friend, hoping he would help solve the mystery.

"It really is huh." Eve replied, looking closer at the object.

Eve prodded it with her still present dagger after slipping it out of her sash. She was kind of grateful she didn't land on her own dagger when she fell or she'd be split down the tummy and half frozen. That would take more than a little hospital bed to heal too, she reckoned. As the extremely sharp weapon moved toward the solid surface, it caught onto something. It was buried as if struck into something wooden. Eve knew that shape. . . it was a box. . . or maybe a chest?

"I'm gonnae try an' open it." She announced, prying with her weapon.

The lid, or maybe the individual planks, were coming apart as she pried. She still wasn't sure if it was a solid box or a chest but her dedicated strength popped the lid off. She then looked down into it, expecting it to contain something. Inside was something, it turned out. Yeah, a gift it was. A very live and healthy rat was rolling around inside. It was chewing on some old wooden trinket.

"Wait! A rat. I have something to deal with this." Eve announced, looking up at the bewildered Rito.

She reached in her pouch and retrieved a big velvet pouch that appeared to be lined with comfortable woolen fabric. Eve undid the little bow holding it together and something came out. It looked like a gross little glowing moth. . . in a dress? Upon closer inspection it was some kind of fairy, which was suddenly very unsurprising since Eve was a Kokiri. But why was she keeping her fairy companion in a little bag? It did look very comfy though.

"Hpappy new year!" the small creature yelled. "Consciousness of the gods we become ill and blow sick."

Alice made a gesture with her tiny hand of vomit coming from her face. Then the rat in the box caught her eye. The little pink eyes glared down, sizing up the rodent and accepting that it was still bigger than her. Jumping off Eve's hand, Alice started to fly. Her body twisted and turned as her wings were unable to keep her upright in the air. The weird meat-colored glowing insectoid hovered and twirled down onto the rat. She clung onto the rodent and started to pet its belly with her spindly pale hands.

"Partitioned by law we eat from their trough. Grand means of supply but the supplier is that devil." she gently said, comforting the rat with sweet nothings from her mouth.

Eve looked satisfied. Satisfied the rat was being pet. Satisfied that her guardian was given something fun to do perhaps, even. That creature. . . was Eve's parental figure? That certainly explained a lot. Although she did have that tree-thing. It was likely this girl didn't have audience with the Deku Tree in many moons, though. The small fairy giggled, narrowly avoiding the rat's sharp teeth as it gnashed playfully. The rodent could probably easily take off the fairy's pink little head.

"aT's enough of that, back in the bag." Eve belted out, aware the toothy creature could turn her friend into a meal at this point.

Eve grabbed the pixie creature and stuffed its sparkly ass back into her pouch. She was willing to put up with a lot but getting the fairy killed would weigh pretty heavily on her conscience. In many ways that fairy was her best friend before she had made any real friends. She normally did a lot to protect Alice, and she was aware the creature was in less danger in the habitat she made for her back at home. Suddenly feeling guilty, Eve retrieved a small piece of cheese and lowered it into the velvet bag.

"Just a little treat." she assured in a hushed tone. They were quickly getting off track.

Responding to Ruairi's comment, Eve looked back in the box. It was interesting seeing the transparent lid climb over the objects inside as she moved her head to look. It was almost like the rat and the piece of wood were manifesting before her eyes. Placing her arm in the box, she retrieved the gnawed object which Ruairi had understandably called a charm. It was a trinket to be sure, but upon examination it was a wooden chess piece with the head mostly gnawed off. Someone around here was surely going to have a pretty bad experience trying to play chess.

The pair quickly moved past the box, barely thinking any more of it. They followed the dim light to what looked like an opening in the left side of the tunnel. They turned their heads into the opening, wary of what was hiding inside. There appeared to be some standing torches, unlit. They surrounded something odd in the center. It smelled like old, rotten blood. There was something wretched standing, hanging from some wooden structure. Around the corners there was the clear shape of bars, appearing to be a number of old containment cells.

"Oh no, stinky." Eve mentioned, trying to look around in the dark. "Not sure this place is truly empty as well."

It seemed there would likely be traps or monsters lying in wait, especially given the circumstances. It seemed like those dark cells may contain something too. . .

Avoiding the weird figure in the center of the room, Eve went to carefully investigate the cells in the corners. She was aware of what Ruairi was saying but kind of iffy on if he really knew what was going on here. That was, until she did a little closer inspection. . .

First was an obvious trap, a wide open cell that looked empty. Starting from the southeast corner, she dropped a small object to see what may be lying in wait. The piece of brick clapped against the floor and a Wallmaster came down. It was almost expected at this point. Eve lunged at the creature as an insect would and pierced its husky skin with her Kingfisher dagger. She dragged its blade down the surface of the necrotic hand and it began to peel in half. The frozen tatters of dead flesh fell to the floor in a heap. She was absolutely NOT going to put up with one of those things getting the jump on her. Never. Then a Skullwalltula burst off the wall and caught her on the chest.

"Ow fuck!" came her exasperated voice from the corner of the chamber.

The pest had bit her on the shoulder before she was able to throw it off of her and start smashing it. It was too icky to look at but now her boots had truly dug into it. The smell was outrageous and Eve bolted as soon as the thing was flattened. She headed to the northeastern corner where things would truly get good. Here she spotted an open cell with a large chest in it. Laid over the wooden vessel was a skeleton in some old clothing. Eve knew what she had found instantly, judging by the skeleton's posture. She flung open the top of the chest which had a familiar smell to it.

Ruairi was right! The chest was piled high with blush, other makeup, and many small vials of perfume. Of course the undead workers had unwittingly carried it all the way here. . . but that didn't make their escape much easier. Eve started to hoard the precious objects into her bag. She had knocked the skeleton flying and it remain in pieces on the other side of the cell. Curious, she sprayed one of the perfumes onto her shoulder. This caused her to scream "Ah fuck" again as the perfume entered her open wound.

"Chicky darling I found all the makeup! It was under this skeleton!" she screamed from the corner. There was no way in hell. She had to be lying.

"Chicky please come over here. Chicky please kiss my boo-boo." Eve enthralled in a deadpan voice. Her finger was pointing at her open wound, which despite being minutes old looked like it could start festering any second.

"In any case why are these even here? I hope they're not all USED or something." she continued, keeping her voice raised regardless of how Ruairi was set to reply.

But perhaps it was the twist, which was the real twist. As in they were being set up for disappointment but the truth was that they had found the motherlode. With that postulation being a sort of reverse surprise, it left both of them extremely skeptical. But many journeys are not a strict set of events from point A to point B. Some journeys take you to point C first and then send you careening like in one of those teacup rides to make you sick and then you reach point B missing all that you had for teatime.

In spite of all that, Eve's wound reeked of poison. Whether she had enlightened Ruairi to that fact previously was up in the air. Now, however Ruairi had witnessed what rancid sin flowed from her heart. In this case literally. There was a lot of weird and unassumable things about this girl, but despite all her odd bodily mysteries the arcane ability to produce her own poison had to be the single weirdest. She was like one of those colorful little frogs but a lot more annoying.

Noting the skeleton once again, it seemed ever likely that what they had witnessed was in fact one of those Gibdos crawling down here with armfuls of products. Then of course it had decided to hoard them in chests, not uncommon behavior for tomb-dwelling monsters. It probably wanted to make a sacrifice to the afterlife or something. But then, Eve thought, had they robbed a tomb and unleashed the wrath of the spirits?!

"If they're used the law enforcement cannot stop us from taking them." she added after a long attempt at deep thought.

"Oh. . . yeah." Eve responded. "Pretty gross innit."

She reached back in her bag, and pulled out some sort of patch-looking thing. The stickied gauze was then slapped directly over the oozing wound. Its white surface instantly clouded red.

"This is why I hate spiders. They prey on little creatures like me." she continued in a loopy voice. She meant vermin. Pests. That's probably what she meant.

Now, Ruairi could see plainly that she was continuing to shovel the goods into her pouch. She was really taking her time doing it, too. Certainly, she was aware she was bringing extra for her incidental friend. He had been given countless examples of why to question this unusual girl. Despite that, she remained enamored by the Rito's sense of style and knack for magic. So then, in the face of their unusual partnership the girl scooped up as much of this excess makeup as she could possibly hold. The snot-dripping girl at least had the sense to make sure he got what he came for. There was no way she would use up all of the goods on herself, especially as she had already planned the next store to hit to stock up.

"I'm gonnae need to buy more anyway. We'll bring all of this back for you!" she triumphed, spraying more perfume in the air.

They were in a good position to stop and rest, anyway. It was concerningly likely they were going to have to haul themselves through this sewer-like mausoleum for some time to come. That said, it seemed Eve wouldn't have to sleep for a while after that incident in the breakroom.

"W-wait you're right." Eve befuddled. "I don't think it's safe unless we check."

She pried open several of the various makeup sets. Some of them were obviously face powder and blush while others were things like little eyeshadow palettes. Setting aside the obvious perfumes, Eve examined as many as she could get open quickly. It seemed regardless of the reason, there were several that looked like they had been through or smudged. Not all of them were tampered with, however. It seemed probable this was just the level of quality control they had in Hyrule, if nothing else. Eve didn't want to use a set that was tainted by a zombie's finger though. Granted her willingness to do gross things was not well quantified.

"Eh, I could keep some of these bad ones if you want all the good ones. However many you wanted to purchase, anyway!" she sang, accidentally knocking a perfume violently to pieces in the cell's corner. "If we can even make it back to the cashier!~" she added, bellowing in frustration.

She had a point. There was a non-zero chance that they were just tip-toeing their way into some more sinister trap. It was kind of outrageous that they were trapped down here with exactly what they had been looking for. But where did Eve want to explore next? She saw some odd things on the other side of the room, including the center. But the outer hallway clearly went somewhere, too. Not that she knew there might be pathways elsewhere in that chamber, in any case. Eve wandered over to the weird torture structure and body in the center of the room. This left Ruairi with a fun little pile of like-new makeup. Score!

Eve thought about what the interesting Rito had been saying. He had a point about being close to the exit. A person with expendable energy would probably not have bothered going very far to hide all these products. . . But wait, she thought. Those Gibdos and zombie-like workers wouldn't have given a crap how far they had to walk to stash a chest full of their random rubbish. Those shoppers and workers actually made EVE look sane in comparison. What a headache.

"You live in a wagon still? Oh buddy. You can visit my house and go through my collection all you like! We're friends now and I think you earned it." she offered, suddenly sticking a hand on her face.

She didn't say he could stay over or relax or anything. But if she was being honest with herself even her full cottage didn't have any space to sit or lay down, and the only bed there was her own. Then, on top of all that her supper/ tea table only really had chairs sized for kids. As well as that weird little high-chair for her fairy guardian to sit on. But that was barely worth thinking about right now. . . Besides, a weird unmaintained cottage stuffed to the ceiling with hoarded nonsense was probably less fun to visit than that little wagon.

"Oh, and the salt licks in the backyard. My sand garden. I could show you so many fun things!" she babbled, her left eye wiggling and drifting again.

Salt licks? Was she trying to attract deer? Why would Ruairi like that in the first place? In that same breath, it was suddenly believable for this particular Kokiri to enjoy licking a rock. With confidence the community of hers was also somewhat aware, that half of her garden wasn't growing flowers because the kid had too much salt lying around. But she had a lot of fun on a warm day running the rake over her sand garden. It wasn't particularly anything to be sad about.

"You also keep flinching whenever I call you Chicky. I'd be fine with calling you something else. Rory, right? Am I pronouncing that right?" she interjected after trading makeup products around. "You also kind of look like a Steven or a Samantha." she continued. At which point she pondered her own concept of gender for a brief moment. She was, at the end of the day, a Kokiri. Their genders were based on how long the skirt on their tunics were, or what hairstyle they had, or something? This particular one had an obsession with elegant clothing and makeup, making her a contrasting standout in that regard. Thinking about this further, she felt like the type of tea she bought had a gendered quality to it.

"Disregard what I said. Rory! is fine. I've decided that lavender in my tea is more 'Samantha' and then bergamot is a little bit more 'Stanley.' But what does that make the honey?" she driveled. If the subject wasn't changed in a minute she was about to give an identity and backstory to the honey she liked. She had already thought about a young adult novel she wanted to write about the bees' lives in which they were all anthropomorphic. Which would make the honey. . . it was best not to think about it.