Lessons In Shapeshifting (Open)

[Yeti]

Fiero squeaked in response. The prank indeed had done its job.

Eventually he fell asleep, nestled in Zalbos's pocket.

When he awoke the setting had changed quite a bit. As far as Fiero had been concerned, the two of them had been heading towards Seren. Instead, as he'd poked his head out while Zalbos walked, an unfamiliar section of forest greeted him. Not just that but the atmosphere felt steeped in magic, a little more than the majority of Serenian terrain. Were they heading towards a magical realm? The air smelled faintly of brimstone, drawing to mind draconic imagery. Dragon territory? Fiero had heard through small-talk of a dragon-touched paradise. The fact that a human settlement was so close to it was curious indeed.

But all that curiosity would have to wait. Hearing some commotion, Fiero realized about an hour later they'd been transferred inside a building of some sort. Once the noise and tension died down, he crawled out of his hiding spot along Zalbos's sleeve.

Seeing bars and drab looking walls, he shot Zalbos a questioning look. What was going on?

[SanguineBladez]

Zalbos could hear some men muttering a short distance away.
"I don't like the look of him."
"You can't just lock someone up because you don't like the look of them. That's... racist or something."
"Can't be bloody racist if I've never seen someone of his race, can it?"
He could hear the guard spit on the ground.

Zalbos brought his voice to a whisper.
"We've been arrested. That guard was skittish and thought I was a threat. I see a good opportunity to study a human though, don't you? It's going to require a bit of work on your part though. See if you can copy me."
The hulking man shapeshifted into a large, highly venomous spider. 8 beast eyes blinked independantly at the gecko, and then talked in a squeaking voice.
"I've only enough venom for one man. You'll have to take care of the other. Pick your poison."

[Yeti]

The tiny gecko balked, jaw wide open. A spider? He'd turn into a giant spider? He'd only just managed to gain this scaly form...

Fiero shook his head. Changing back was much easier than changing from one form to another newer one. He quickly flew up to the spider's 'ear' - or at least where he gauged it might be - and whispered. "I have another idea. Perhaps we could distract one and take the other? I don't think it'll be too easy for me to achieve an eight-legged form, nor one with enough venom to take down a full-grown human."

He looked around the barren room, towards a barred window. "I know a good way to cause a distraction."

Between the bars, a few thin strings of vine and ivy were already beginning to coil down from outside. They clumped at the bottom of the wall, the strings tangling together into a lump of plant matter that shrugged like a slime into the hallway outside their cell.

Fiero could easily navigate it to distract a guard into following it outside.

[SanguineBladez]

Zalbos snarled. He'd hoped for more bloodshed. He sighed in defeat and waved away the fairy with a thin limb.
"Just don't get yourself killed," Zalbos exclaimed with an air or sarcasm.
He scuttled out of the locked cell, and up the wall, easily onto the cobwebbed corner above the guards. He made himself slightly smaller so as to not draw any suspicion until his fae friend had followed through.
"Come on, Fiero."

[Yeti]

Concentrating, Fiero beckoned the mop of plant to slog along the side of the wall, undulating towards the doorway where the two guards stood.

From his vantage point, now hovering just beyond the bars, he could see the one guard standing stiffly after speaking with his partner. The man was a bit portly, wearing a sharp uniform, silver hair puffing out from under a cap. The other guard was taller, gruffer, with a black mustache and thick eyebrows. He was chewing something, looking away from his partner, and seemed closest to the spider awaiting them.

"I still think it's kinda racist. Everyone's got swords. My mum's half-gnome on her father's side and she's got a sword. Tiny little thing."

"You know what we call gnome-swords?" The mustachioed guard grinned, "Butter knives."

"Feh."

So the silver-haired one would be the one to distract. Fiero allowed the plant to shrug further.

It slipped next to the guard's boot, thin strands of ivy barely touching his leg. Fiero saw the guard do a double-take, surprised. "Hey!"

The plant began to scuttle past the guards, rushing outside as quick as a mop of vines could. Now the portly guard ran after it, though he wasn't nearly as fast. "Wait! Get back here!"

"I'll hold the line!" The mustached one cried out, standing at attention now. Little did he know that just above him was his doom...