I'm Totally Taking You Down With Me {open}

[Laharl Krichevskoy]

Laharl sprinted away from the mall at top speed, his various necklaces jingling and jangling upon his chest. It was times like this that made Laharl wonder if perhaps he hadn't been wrong about wearing the excessive amount of bling. Sure, he felt a little stronger than he had before he'd started wearing them; he was pretty sure he was actually toughening up all around, though not nearly as fast as he should be given his powers and inclinations, but Laharl still felt like he was being dragged down by the various bangles.

Especially now, when he was sprinting from the mall at top speed. Apparently they didn't want people to loot things from the mall, which didn't make a lot of sense to Laharl. There were seriously bits and pieces of the place that were utterly covered in animal feces. Who wanted a sweater that guinea pigs had obviously been using as a toilet for an extended period of time? And Laharl was pretty positive that the necklaces he was currently wearing were actually used for bird's nests or something. He wasn't exactly keen on the details. They'd just been laying there, practically begging to be taken. So Laharl had taken. Took. whatever worked for that sentence.

And then the suits had shown up. And now Laharl was carrying a bag of loot and sprinting away from the mall wondering about the various items he was carrying and wearing. He squinted into the low light (what kind of idiot waits till it gets dark? everyone expects you to rob a place at night. Better to do it when the sun was setting). Then he saw someone, someone who was totally not expecting this. Without any warning, Laharl shoved his sack of loot into the person's chest, and said in the most commanding tone he could manage:

"Hide this for me! The suits are right there, and if you don't think of something, I'm totally taking you down with me."

And with those brave words, Laharl dived for the closest bush, where he made perhaps the most obvious noisy escape in the history of escaping.

[Pascal Grünewald]

Pascal enjoyed the mall now that he kind of knew what it was for. He liked to watch the people go by and he loved to ogle in the shop windows, looking at all the things that people could possibly buy. They didn’t particularly like that he walked around barefoot, but Pascal didn’t like shoes. They felt unnatural. So naturally, they kicked him out of the mall, pointing to the sign about having to wear shoes. What a disappointment.

The chameleon was walking away from the mall when he saw the boy running away. Pascal stopped to watch for a moment before a sack of something was being shoved at him. His eyes widened comically at the boy who was now ordering him around and then diving into a bush.

Pascal had no idea what to do. He looked around for a moment, looking for a place to hide, panic growing in his chest because he didn’t question why the boy had a sack of stuff or why the suits were chasing him in the first place. He just ducked behind a tree,eyes darting around, hoping that the suits hadn’t seen him. He plastered himself against the tree trunk and instinctively began to turn the same brown as the tree trunk. It was unfortunate that he was wearing a purple suit, which definitely stood out against the brown of the tree trunk.

[Laharl Krichevskoy]

Laharl continued making noise, thus further proving that Demon Overlords were not good at the whole stealth thing. In point of fact, he seemed to be purposefully sucking more at it as he went. And why not? He had the nervous guy standing there holding his loot, so if anyone got blamed, it would be him, not the Great Laharl (and yes, Laharl did think of himself in that manner, capital letters and all). The suits were thundering close, though Laharl managed to more or less get situated before they arrived. And when they did, they seemed rather confused. They'd been chasing a small, awesome boy, and they clearly had expected him to be around. And if Laharl had even the smallest modicum of his original power (seriously, he suspected he'd been reduced below level one, somehow), he'd have lashed out or stood his ground.

Now though, hiding was good, hiding was very good.

"The kid has to be around here somewhere," commented one suit, conveniently a female. Her partner, also female, nodded her head as well. There was some gesturing, and the two broke off to begin casing the area. Given Laharl's expert ability in hiding, he was likely to be found soon. However, the first female had stepped forward to examine one of the trees in the mall's parking lot.

"Hey, when did they start putting purple suits on trees?" she wondered aloud, turning to her partner. Said partner was nearly head-deep in the shrubbery, and she turned to look at the mention. The first, who we shall call Rookie for purposes of convenient labeling, stretched out a hand to lightly prod at the purple suit, as if trying to feel it out, as though touch could help her understand what sort of strange situation this was.