D.E.M.O.N.S: Getting Summoned Weekly isn't so Bad

”Well we can’t exactly summon Kat right here. We’ll need to wait for permission and even then she’ll have to be directed through the compound,” said Nira. ”Is there anything we can do for Lily while we wait for that?”

Slethnoth ’tapped’ his chin. It looked more like a finger was blending into his face and separating over and over but there was a SOUND. Lily didn’t know what to make of the fact that strange shadow demons made sounds. ”Perhaps teaching her to use the body? A small obstacle course including running, jumping, a bit of flying? Careful with the flying though. If she doesn’t take to it quickly it might cause dissociation.”

*Wait flying? Oh my god I forgot my wings! I thought I just forgot my tail. I’m an idiot.* Lily tried to flex her wings and found it much less intuitive compared to her tail. It seemed to have a bit of a mind of its own and could easily wiggle around behind her back. Her wings on the other hand seemed to need a firmer hand. She needed to know what she wanted them to do and they acted a little like an extra set of arms.

*Or would it just be set of arms because in this form I don’t have any? Wait… my default form is a Memphis now. Am I not actually a catgirl but instead a girlcat? Or does my previous human form weigh in and make me a catgirl again. These are important questions.* 

Truth be told though, Lily was mostly just passing the time as she further attuned herself to the new body. Her soul might not be synchronising properly but she felt that was no reason to stop her mind from making an attempt. After about five minutes she was successfully running around on the table, though she new it wasn’t her full speed. The table wasn’t really large enough to attempt it.

In the background of those five minutes Nobody and Slethnoth were going over the details for setting Lily up with an obstacle course of some kind. Lily wasn’t really paying attention and was surprised to find that her ears could much more easily filter sound. What she didn’t know was that it was more to do with the changes to her brain then to her ears. Some more experimentation would be needed.

Eventually though, Lily felt a hand on her back. It was soft and gentle, something only to get her attention. Her knew instincts reared their heads though and she spun around and clawed at the ’offending’ hand. As soon as her head was around to see what she was sniping at Lily tried to stop her arm but failed at that. She did however manage to retract her claws in time and only lightly batted away Nobody’s hand. Granted, with the durability Nobody had as a high ranking demon it wouldn’t have even cut her skin, but it was the thought that counts.

”Sorry for startling you,” said Nobody. ”I wanted to let you know we’ve worked out a tentative way to go about that. I’ll be heading out to get it sorted then we’ll call you later.”

*How do I convey ’it’s ok that was my fault’ as cat? The board doesn’t have something like that… hmm… wait I know.* 

Lily moved herself forward and started to lightly head but Nobody’s coat. Nobody was a bit too far away to bump properly but the coat flared out enough to just barely reach her. Seeing this Nobody reached a hand out and gave Lily a light scratch on the head before swiftly exiting the room.

Once Nobody had left, Slethnoth went back to looking over Lily’s new medical charts while making sure to keep a steady eye, literally, on the chart that gave information about her soul and how it was settling in. Nira on the other hand, offered Lily a chance to get off the table for a bit and try running around which was accepted.

Once on the ground Lily spent most of the next twenty minutes trying to get to her maximum speed to no avail. Her initial acceleration was great, and allowed her to get up to the equivalent of her best sprint in just a few seconds, but once that initial boost from pouncing left her, further acceleration was much more gradual and took a decent bit of effort on her behalf. The size of the room was still limiting her ability to find that max speed.

It did help her get more in tune with her wings though. She was starting to use them to help with turning and slowing down when she wanted to stop. Their range of motion was generous vertically but rather limited horizontally and only slightly better diagonally. Still, the acclimatisation was going quite well. The only thing she hadn’t gotten used to was sensing electrical impulses through her whiskers, but that was because the effect hadn’t started yet for some reason. Something she did wonder about.

Eventually Nobody returned and gestured for Lily to follow along before taking off down the corridor at a speed Lily couldn’t really match. Nira sighed behind the Memphis and scooped her up into a hold and ’sprinted’ after Nobody. For Nira, this wasn’t even a light jog in terms of effort but Nobody had neglected to remember how ’slow’ Lily was.

Lily was mostly just conflicted about the whole thing. She had no warning before Nira snatched her up, and felt slight annoyance at that fact. She’d reacted so strongly to a soft hand but couldn’t avoid being carried like, well, a large part of her mind wanted to say child but the more reasonable part realised she was being carried like she was. A cat.

It was also odd watching the walls rush past as Nira slowly gained on Nobody, not wanting to move faster and risk hurting Lily. Lily found herself unable to lose track of the movement. She could always tell which direction they were going and roughly how fast even if that didn’t translate into understandable speeds. It was also worth noting that she still didn’t have the quality of vision to watch things as they blurred past, her eyes improved, but not so far improved to compete with a Rank 5 demon at all.

Eventually the pair managed to catch Nobody just as she reached the door they were headed for, calling into question just how unplanned the whole thing might have been. Nobody didn’t say anything though and simply pushed open the door to reveal a large gymnasium like room. It had lines drawn all over the floor in various different colours but with a quarter of the room covered, Lily couldn’t easily identify what sports they were. Her best guess was a set for basketball but the other colours weren’t easy to guess the full layout of.

In that corner though was a full obstacle course that had clearly been shrunken down. The fact that it fit so easily into a quarter of the room seemed to imply that it was a quarter of the size. I wonder if it was just shrunk the way Kat’s knew chair does. Plenty of things seem to have that ability so I think it’s a reasonable guess. 

There was all sorts of things in the obstacle course. Stairs, a climbing wall, a few hoops Lily thought she was meant to jump through but were actually meant to be swung on at human size. There were plenty of obstacles to try and get through, and Lily was wondering how hard it would be. The course was clearly designed for a more normal sized individual and the climbing wall in particular was for something with HANDS but otherwise it seemed quite possible to her.

”Well Lily. Want to test this out?” said Nobody with a grin.

*I don’t know… how do I want to do this? What I’d really like to do is use the free space on the side and try and find my max speed or perhaps use it fore flying practice. Sure the obstacle course looks interesting but it clearly isn’t designed for me, it’s designed for people. People have hands normally and I can already tell the climbing wall will be an issue unless I can fly up it… probably. Then again… some of those spots… no. I could probably have used them as places to stand at full size but shrunk down like this it would be too hard.*

*Then again… it does look kind of fun…* Lily’s knew Memphis instincts were flaring in the background. The chance to show off and prove she had control over her body mixed with an instinctive need to play were pushing her towards at the very least trying out. Lily gave Nira a slight bop before wiggling out of her arms. A surprisingly difficult task that she only really accomplished once Nira let her go towards the end.. Not that Lily would admit to that fact, especially when she was allowed to lie.