thatsamilkshake | On the Way to Strokes of Genius, Wednesday Afternoon

Was it possible, really possible, for anyone to be so completely oblivious to what was going on in the skies over Fandom that they'd be tra-la-la-ing down the path with a very literal basket of goodies over one arm, The Best of the Bangles bouncing in their headphones, and not so much as a hat or an umbrella in sight, let alone a weapon?

...Have you met Francine?

Close your eyes, give me your hand... Between the music in her ears, the off-key version coming out of her mouth, and the fact that she was following instructions and bopping along the road with her hand out and her eyes closed, there was no way she was going to notice anything was up.

Until the first bit of up fell down on her, hitting her outstretched hand with a distinct but sadly not de-stinked SPLAT.

"Bwuh?" Eye-opening was followed by, "EWWWWWWW! What?" and looking up at the sky. ".............Oh, CRAP."

Well, yes. But also? Huge screeching bird-things with horrible almost-human faces, and sharp, sharp claws. How did she know they were sharp? Just a guess, courtesy the one that was currently circling lower in her direction, claws outstretched.

To her credit, she didn't completely freeze there. ~~For more than a few seconds.~~ She did manage to start running. Just long enough to trip over her skirt and send herself sprawling, cookies rolling out of the basket and off down the street.

Flat on her back in the road. Bird-thing cannonballing down towards her. "HeLLLllllLLLLllllLLLP!"

[For small blondes with issues!]

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"...People can do that?" Francine murmured after one of Katchoo's more colorful criticisms. She managed to get half-upright again and was slowly crabwalking backwards -- okay, scooting backwards on her butt -- away from the flailing wings.

"You oughtta know, pork roast!" the harpy screeched, still favoring her wing as she made a return circle towards Katchoo. "Your mom does it every night! With ketchup!"

Oh, people could do that. Katchoo knew a little too well.

What the harpy apparently didn't know, though, was the effect a "your mom" riposte would have on her.

"Night, hell," Katchoo roared with a mighty if style-free axe-chop blow. "You, in broad frikkin' daylight, with . . ."

Ewwwwwww.

It hadn't actually been her mom that ahkjdha;iou was screaming about - she was more like a handful of goldfish crackers, after all, not a nice round succulent rump roast - but the harpy didn't get a chance to correct the misinterpretation.

Unless Katchoo could pick some up from the "AWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWAAAAWWWWWWWWWWWWCK!" as bird and bat connected.

Francine stared openmouthed as feathers flew everywhere.

Katchoo kinda kept swinging the bat, though, because she was on a roll, and she'd privately named the harpy Darcy, so . . . yeah. Plenty of accusations to fling, and no real need to have to imagine them.

"And you --" WHACK.

"Not to mention --" THUNK WHACK CRUNCH.

"Plus --" CRUNCH CRUNCH WHAPPITY CRUNCH.

"STAY THE HELL AWAY FROM HER FROM NOW ON, YOU . . ." Blink. "SO THERE."

You know that sound Chester Cheetah makes on the Cheetos commercials when his head's just been slammed into something? That "ai-idddddididididididdi-ai" sound like his brains are sloshing around in his head and he has to slosh them back into place?

Yeah, that sound. "Yeah well.....uhhhhhh..." The harpy snapped her bird-beak a few times; gold eyes crossed and almost rolled back up into her skull when the last hit sent her soaring into the air, completely without any use of her own wings.

"Yer......faaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaace...." she gasped feebly as she became a smaller and smaller speck in the sky, until the only sign of her was the feathers still raining down.

"Meep," was all Francine, clutching her empty goodie basket, had to say.

That was when Katchoo dropped the baseball bat and scrambled over.

"Francine? Francine! Are you okay? Speak to me!"

"Meep?" she repeated, though in a slightly larger font. "Big....bird....thing." She was fine, aside from a slightly bruised ego at the rump roast comment, and a slightly bruised rump roast from falling back on it several times.

Aaaaaaaand also possibly from a Katchoo trying to tackleglomp her. "C'mon, Francie," she said with a regretful look at the scattered cookies, "you can't stick around out here. Are you sure you're okay?"

"It broke the cookies," Francine said dazedly, but a little bit less than the last dazed thing she said, while being tackleglomped. "I'm fine. But I was bringing you cookies!"

"Screw a bunch of cookies, Francie, you were almost giant bird-thing food!" Katchoo'd gone from tackleglomping to attempting to tug Francine back to her feet, which might be kind of a logistical challenge right now.

She was glad they were back on baked-goods delivery terms, though.

Well, Francine was helping. Sort of. So she did manage to get upright. Just in time to tackleglomp again. "You saved me!"

"Oof -- hey, you ditz!" Not that Katchoo was arguing with the tackleglomping. "What did you think, I'd just leave you there to get pecked apart like a . . . I don't know, one of those birdseed sticks? Which you will be if we don't get inside somewhere, so come on, I'm not gonna bust my butt saving you just to let that happen again."

Francine wasn't about to stop glomping just yet. "Are you kidding? They're probably all afraid to come near you now!"

Katchoo had to crane her neck a little to peer around Francine and see something circling . . . not overhead exactly. Overhead-ish. Which was close enough.

"Uh, Francie, running now would be good."

"Huh----- OH! Running! Running now! Running good! Do any of those cookies look clean? No, sorry, running!"

"GEEZ, FRANCINE!" Hard to tell who might be dragging who along here, really. Unless you were wondering about Clocky. "NEVER MIND THE COOKIES, JUST GET THE LEAD OUT!"

"Getting! I'm getting!" Though she took the time to sweep up Clocky into her basket. What? No way he could keep up on those tiny wheels!

Clocky tweeted appreciatively, and Katchoo skidded a little on the pavement.

"Crap crap crap crap crap crap -- NO, THAT'S NOT A SUGGESTION!"

On the Way to Strokes of Genius, Wednesday Afternoon

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