Sing A Little Song(Axle)
Date: 2026-06-03 20:13
(Sing A Little Song(Axle):Axle)
[Wed Jun 3 2026]
On Colonial Avenue
It is after dusk, about 67F(19C) degrees, and there are a few wispy white clouds in the sky. The mist is heaviest At Hawthorn and Franklin
There is a waning gibbous moon.
The song is ever present now, humming through the air in an almost tangible wave of sound.
“Its inside…” Axle tells the others, rubbing his ears. “Been getting worse all damn day.”
Regaldo snorts as he reaches up and rips the bandages clear of his throat. His phone slips into his pocket while he gives a nod to the others.
Rosalina perks up at hearing the song in fuller swing, and she quickly slips a few items around that she had ready. She starts off by putting a small set of wired headphones in her ears, tacked into a walkman tape player. She also produces a Mozart cassette tape and slides it in, looking at the sky. She says, “You had non idea I would learn the magic boxes of this time! Take this, song!” and she claps the player closed and hits the play button like she practized this in the mirror a few dozen times.
Regaldo grins at Rosalina, the expression sadly hidden behind his gas mask which he tugs off and squirrels away.
Maeve sighs as she looks up toward the third floor, hand on the handle of her knife.
Regaldo makes a sound of discomfort while tugging down his turtle neck.
The walkman isn’t working, and Rosalina plucks the earbuds out, getting everything situated back in her clothes again. After having it that loud it’s a little while before she can hear anything else other than the sang, so naturally she sings out, “We’ll dance together, beneath this tree…” and looks around, suddenly chirping out, “Hm if song is inside then should we check out inside? Oui? Is there anything to speak to officer about this time?
“No officer.” Axle shakes his head. “We… well, Lucas is gone.” He turns to the building, humming the song as he begins to walk.
Regaldo silently follows along towards the building.
Maeve takes a deep breath in, holds it, then lets it out.
Rosalina looks around all over the hallways and then at Regaldo, staring intently at him. “I will non let anything happen to you this time. You have treat me like family. If I do nothing else, you must live.”
Jabbing the button a little harder than he must have meant to, Axle stops, waiting for the elevator.
Regaldo places his hand gently against his chest. Probably nerves. He does give a weary smile to Rosalina, nodding.
Maeve leans against the opposite wall from everyone else, then mutters, “Maybe I should be the one gas masked…”
The elevator doors give a cheery ‘ding!’ as they slide open. However, the sound is strangely warped, as if heard underwater.
Rosalina nods back at Regaldo and looks up and down the hallway again, listening around and even turning with a concerned look on her face. As she steps into the elevator, she innocently asks its button panel, “Who hurt you?”
Rosalina hums along to the elevator song.
The elevator car begins its leissurely ascent. The elevator music eerily matching to the song sang into the mind. Finally, the door slides open, and the group is allowed to exit. The door to Miss Hughs’ apartment stands slightly ajar on the right.
Regaldo doesn’t seem to hear Maeve, or doesn’t react to her remark as he draws his sidearm and holds it close. He peeks his head out of the elevator and then down the hall before motioning with his noggin.
Rosalina zooms out of the elevator after Regaldo, coming winging around his side when she sees him draw iron. She looks tensely the same way he’s looking, and she repositions to slightly behind Regaldo. Then something dawns on her.
Rosalina says “Fuck! “
Regaldo freezes on the spot. If the man had fur all of his hackles would be raised but something seems to have set him on edge. The grip on his pistol tightens as he exhales a breath only to raise the weapon and flick on the red laser attached to it.
Maeve takes a cautious step forward, hands held out, to see if what she’s experiencing is a visual hallucination.
The door, bumped by Maeve’s hands, swings a bit more open, firelight flooding through where there should be no firelight at all.
“I forget my bow,” Rosalina says apologetically to Regaldo, looking at someone and Maeve. She steps back slowly with her hands raising and says, “Please trust me, I am taking the collar off and…” She shudders, closing her eyes as she’s lifting her chain necklace off herself and bringing the key on it to the lock on her collar. It opens with a satisfying click, and she shudders again. “No… Grandmother is the one who haunts me and tried to kill me! She would never bake for me now! I saw the hunter kill her!” Shaking her head to try to snap herself out of it, she lifts the collar off her neck. “But I need grandmother to possess me for this!”
“I forget my bow,” Rosalina says apologetically to Regaldo, looking at Axle and Maeve. She steps back slowly with her hands raising and says, “Please trust me, I am taking the collar off and…” She shudders, closing her eyes as she’s lifting her chain necklace off herself and bringing the key on it to the lock on her collar. It opens with a satisfying click, and she shudders again. “No… Grandmother is the one who haunts me and tried to kill me! She would never bake for me now! I saw the hunter kill her!” Shaking her head to try to snap herself out of it, she lifts the collar off her neck. “But I need grandmother to possess me for this!”
Regaldo shoots a rather odd look at Maeve with both brows raising.
Looking to Rosalina, Regaldo nods and gives her a thumbs up, probably able to guess what is coming next.
Rosalina(wolf) shakes a little to ruffle out her fur.
“I will not burn, and I will not give in…” Maeve is saying, as she pushes the door, and steps inside. Despite the firelight.
Regaldo moves to cover Rosalina(wolf)’s flank while drawing out his phone with his free hand. “Seems there’s one in particular hunting for you, Maeve. They want you to burn so they may love you forever.” chirps out from his phone in that neutral tone before he pockets it again.
“Yeah, well, that’s my whole family,” Maeve calls over to Regaldo as she walks deepr into the apartment.
Rosalina(wolf) also forgot wolf mode had perception out the ass
As the door swings open, a flood of firelight washes into the hall. Beyond the door lies a chapel. A familiar chapel, shrouded in mist. In the center of the room, the altar stands. But surrounding that altar, is a roaring pyre. And strapped to that pyre, skin crackling from the heat, is Maeve. But not Maeve, as Maeve is with the group as well, not on that blazing pyre.
Maeve examines pyre!Mae to see if she looks like current Mae, or Mae of six years ago.
Rosalina(wolf) follows Maeve in and when it’s a chapel, with a false one burning in the middle, her fur bristles and she lunges out protectively in front of the real Maeve. She faces the blazing pyre with her teeth all bared, eyes dead on the doppleganger within the flames, and she also looks around the area upon further approach.
Regaldo stares flatly at the Pyre-Maeve with his lips pressing into a thin line. No words are needed as the laser from his pistol gets centered on the things head. He spares a glance to Maeve and Rosalina(wolf), only to give his head a shake. His eyes narrow to slits as he tries to keep his focus on the woman in the pyre.
The congregation is there, in their pews, eyes vacant in their death moments, but still singing softly, their voices audible even over the roar of the flames.
Maeve wanders about the pyre, investigating.
Rosalina(wolf) growls not just at the pyre, but also has trouble after a while figuring out which side of Maeve to be on, seeming to detect things from all sides, with no way to be sure if anything is really in any one particular spot, or not. Hyper-alert canine’s not doing too hot right now.
Regaldo puffs out his cheeks as he stalks forward to keep himself flanking both Maeve and Rosalina(wolf) while looking about for anything that stands out. Besides, the burning chapel and the woman in the pyre, obviously.
Maeve pauses, and squats down, looking at something, touching it to see if it crumbles.
Continuing to be clueless about what’s real and what’s not in the shadows, Rosalina(wolf) sticks close to Maeve. She takes the opposite side from Regaldo, but also keeps an eye on him on occasion too, as if sensing something amiss more than just the song she’s trying not to howl to the beat to.
Maeve ponders the fire.
Maeve says “Gentlefriends, I have a bad idea.“
And then Maeve has Rosalina(wolf)’s full attention, tail perked up as much as ears.
“That’s not comforting…” Axle grumbles, eyeing the fire.
Regaldo starts making his way towards the pyre, each step seeming leadened with his gaze cutting to Maeve at the mention of idea. The large man does not stop his approach, however.
Rosalina(wolf) nudges to get between the real someone and the one in the fire, looking at the latter intently for a while.
Rosalina(wolf) nudges to get between the real Maeve and the one in the fire, looking at the latter intently for a while.
“There are bones in there that don’t belong to my doppel-Mae-er,” Maeve shares. “We need to get them out, I think.”
“They are your bones. Mother.” The voice slithers in from nowhere, the mist shifting as it begins to thick. “Yours, from the first time.”
“Do believe me, Congregation, my bones are well accounted for from my first death by fire,” Maeve dismisses the voice in her ear, haughty.
Rosalina(wolf) looks slowly from Maeve to the other one and then to the bones, back to the one standing with us all… then looking down at the ground, she shorts out a huff and backs up a few steps. She’s already looking suspiciously at the one in the pyre. Bones. Then her ears perk up at something and she whimpers softly, but then looks back to the burning pyre again. She growls at it, as if blaming it for her failures thus far. Now as if bound to start a redemption arc against fate, she faces the pyre again trying to find a way to lurche in the for bone after bone, trying to pull the ones that don’t belong.
A sibilant laugh hisses through the chapel, the mist rippling. “Not you, Maeve Pierce. Our Mother.” The body on the pyre shifts slightly, one arm jerking up to drive a charred hand into its own chest, the movements sharp and sudden like that of a puppet clumsily worked.
Coming to a stop at the pyre, Regaldo stares up at the woman there. The Maeve. Probably being awash in the heat of the pyre, the corner of the fat man’s lip twists upwards with a sudden lurch as he tries to stop the pyre Maeve from giving her heart a hand hug.
Maeve had the same thought as Regaldo and tries to stop her, as well.
Both the bones and Maeve’s dople-mae-er are about a foot and a half into the fire.
As Regaldo reaches into the fire, the flames lick at his hand, the flesh immediately scorching as the hand plunges in with a burst of embers and a dry popping sound.
Rosalina(wolf) growls in discontent as the flames win out over her attempts, and she looks to see what Regaldo and Pyre Woman are doing, setting into a lower hunch to prepare. But Maeve moves to help first, so she watches, and more importantly, watches to see if either of them can make the save first. When they fail she springs into action behind, trying to dash jump and leap over the fire, hoping to bite Pyre Woman’s arm right off.
A silent scream escapes Regaldo with his features twisting in pain as he’s burned but he tries his damnedest to pull something out with him on the exit trip.
Maeve’s flesh, too, sears as she reaches into that fire. And then, like some kind of wolf missile, Rosalina(wolf) comes streaking through the flames, slamming the body off the pyre with a thud, tearing her arm away as wolf and Pyremae come rolling from the fire.
There is a flatness to Maeve’s expression. Well, expression isn’t so right, so much as an absence of one, as her nightmares come true, yet again, and she looks at her arm, as though it belonged to someone else.
Rotisserie fat man anyone? Regaldo pats furiously at his arm to put out any lingering flames only to give an appreciative whistle in Rosalina(wolf)’s direction. He shifts focus after to Maeve giving her a floating thumbs up or down gesture.
“You bring Mother from the pyre… and yet you bring her within you as well.” The voice hisses. “But… that is fine. For we. Will have. Our Mother.” The mist begins to tremble.
Rosalina(wolf) lets go of the arm upon landing, the fur of her belly in cinders and embers at first. But that stop, drop, and roll works, and after a panicked time rolling on her belly, she curls up a little, licking her belly to squelch out the last of the sizzles that were left. She looks at the arm, and what damage she did to it, having entirely taken the goal as keep pyre woman’s hand out of her chest, and not given any thought to the woman’s actual safety. She gets up and shakes to ruffle her fur from head to ass, giving an extra flick of her tail as if to say, Take That, Dice Of fate. After looking briefly at Pyre Woman, she turns her head slowly and with concern to behold the real Maeve.
Lifting his axe, Axle continues to hum the song.
“I’d kill myself before I’d give you my people!” Maeve calls out to the Congregation, without a second of thought.
The congregation begins to shift, bodies pressing forward.
Maeve feels her chest, just in case.
Regaldo exhales a slow breath as he closes his eyes for a moment only for his lips to peel back as he points his pistol at the version of Maeve that got pulled out of the pyre by Rosalina(wolf). His eyes open then harshly narrow as he pulls the trigger, or tries to, with a single shot ringing out in the chapel.
Rosalina(wolf) suddenly looks a little irked about something, more than a slightly flame touched wolf usually looks, and she snaps her jaws off to the side, wrestling with something before regaining control again with a weird sounding growl. The russet-furred wolf starts to circle the pyre at first, growling one by one at the congregation. But as she rounds to where Maeve and Regaldo are again, she takes a protective stance and hunches down, snapping toward the congregation a couple times between growls.
Regaldo exhales sharply after that, nearly dropping his pistol as he grabs his chest and drops to a knee.
Rosalina(wolf) immediately turns around to Regaldo and puts herself under pert of his chest to help support him.
The body on the ground begins to tremble, mist and shadows swirling to engulf it as it rises with a strange crackling sound. And then, another something, like a misty apparition, detaches from Maeve’s front, racing toward the burnt body, slipping into it with a soft hiss of laughter.
Rosalina(wolf) catches this rush of movement, but it’s too late to eat the body so…
Regaldo’s world is one of pain presently as he accepts Rosalina(wolf)’s support and uses her to push himself back to his feet.
While she normally stands almost with knees locked to live through her pain, the feeling of that ripping free has Maeve stumbling, coughing out a sob, falling to her knees.
Regaldo shoots a look to Maeve with his lips pressing into a thin line. He gives a nod to Rosalina(wolf) when she steps in front of him with his pistol raising at the nearest shadow.
As the body rises, shrouded in shadows, the congregation surges forth, forms sweeping over the chapel as they charge.
Rosalina(wolf) is locked the fuck in and growling at shadow momma.
Regaldo growls as he levels his pistol at the nearest shadow and pulls the trigger.
Rosalina(wolf) steps slowly forth from Regaldo, and then lurches forward at the shadow beasts.
Regaldo grins as he continues his onslaught, laughing silently.
The shadow woman suddenly slashes into her wrist, casting black ichor toward Regaldo.
Maeve is staring at this creature that wears her form, as so far as it does.
Rosalina(wolf) growls viciously with her assault on the shadowy woman, not at all deterred by missing the first two lunges. She circles the woman, trying to separate her from the pack before lunging again with another dread snap of her jaws.
Regaldo gestures with his burned hand as if giving orders while shooting at the remaining shadows using his pistol.
Regaldo dumps the spent mag and reloads quickly.
Maeve entirely ignores the shadowy burns as they land on her.
This time Rosalina(wolf) gets flesh and after grazing her once, she turns and dashes, coming in for a low bite across Pyre woman’s light. And she’s not done yet. In an angry flurry she even turns an lunges for face!
But Pyre woman gets an arm up in front of her face, and Rosalina(wolf) viciously starts jerking on it again and again as she lands, tugging against Pyre woman’s burn mottled flesh!
Regaldo pants lightly with his burned left arm dangling at his side, mostly useless while he glares down the iron sites at the fallen shadows.
As the burned woman falls lifeless to the ground, the mist emits a loud, ear piercing shriek. “Mother! Mother!” A thousand voices chanting the word over and over and over again. The mist begins to shiver, folding and warping and then… a massive shape begins to emerge…
Once Rosalina(wolf) gets the Pyre woman to the floor, forcing her into a horrid state, she jerks around even more viciously on the arm she got, aiming to rend it too. Then she turns her focus to the nearest shadow minion, leaping into the air to slash its shoulder with a heavy rake! She has gone entirely into a frenzy since charging in.
“Your Mother is a CUN–” Maeve is saying, then she sees what’s happening with the mist and stumbles backwards into Axle.
Regaldo glances to Axle, then Maeve, then wolf, in turn to check their condition while something congeals from the mist. He dumps the mag and slides in a fresh one while his chest heaves. He is too fat for this shit.
Rosalina(wolf) does not notice the shape emerging until after her slash of the shadow creature, and she turns to see. That scares her to get right in front of Regaldo again.
Emerging from the mist is a monstrous form, not even human in shape. Two massive claws sweep out as it opens a thousand, dead maws, wailing out that horrid, vile, sweet, beautiful song.
Regaldo lightly pats Rosalina(wolf) when she returns to his side.
The wraith locks its eyes on Maeve.
Regaldo glances to Rosalina(wolf) and then to the a towering, mist filled wraith and nods.
Axle grunts as he is thrown back.
With the rest clear, Regaldo holsters his side arm and draws his blade, charging in.
Rosalina(wolf) makes haste to pick up the pace and try to disgrace the wraith with a claw in the face but just like this rap, that didn’t go over too well.
Flanking Rosalina(wolf) as they move, nearly in tandem with Regaldo dodging the animal, the fat man lashes out at the mist with his blade.
Regaldo growls as a towering, mist filled wraith barely misses him with the man taking a step back to fire a shot off at the mist.
“Leave my boyfriend ALONE!” Maeve screams, putting herself between the mist and Axle.
Rosalina(wolf) actually canine grins a little at seeing Regaldo do that move. She comes like-wize around him, darting left then right to angle around trying to nail the wraith, but she gets blasted back and whimpers with the roll on the floor. She gets back up in it though and charges in headlong a second time, this time with her teeth going for the wraith’s throat, but the wraith is quick, keeping Rosalina on her toes.
“You killed our Mother!” The wraith wails in a thousand voices, swinging its massive, misty claws.
“I intend to kill you too,” Maeve shares, breathily, panting as she swings.
The corners of Regaldo’s lips twist up in a wicked smile as Rosalina(wolf) continues to press the attack, even as they’re thrown back, he charges back in flanking the large wolf and slashing at the mist wraith with his blade.
Maeve cacles as they start to tear into this being.
Rosalina(wolf) is tenacious if nothing else, and she continues to give the wraith as much hell as she can. The way the two move around each other, if its minions weren’t already dead the might have named it dances With Wolves. But then on a suddenly higher jump, the wolf gets lucky, almost nailing neck!
Settling in with his shotgun, Axle begins to blast at the wraith from the perfect range.
Rosalina(wolf) roars out her wolfy approval between swipes at this wraith.
Regaldo shifts about a towering, mist filled wraith with feints while trying to keep the damned things focus on him only to get ragdolled to the ground. He picks himself up, panting heavily, and continues to press the attack.
Maeve pants, heavily, hands on thighs, hair falling into her face.
Regaldo fires off his last round, the slide of his pistol locking back and she drops to his knees panting.
Maeve says “Is… is it fucking done?“
This time Rosalina(wolf) whimpers from that blast back and actually stays down. She lays there for a few seconds after the battle is over, then shaking her head as she gets rolled over and up to her feet. She trots right over and makes absolutely no move to catch Maeve at all like she halfway did for Regaldo, but she returns to his side, panting hard and head heald high and proud.
Axle racks his shotgun, unloading shell after shell into the being until finally. It shrieks. The song turns discordant, breaking apart into a thousand shards of glass that tear at the mind. An explosion rips outward from the wraith, screaming faces whipping past as a whirlwind tears through the chapel. The fire is snuffed with one final burst of sparks, the mist sent retreating back against the walls. And then, falling from where the wraith’s chest would have been… a small earring hits the floor with a ding, glowing with a faint, red light.
Regaldo lets the empty pistol clatter to the floor as he gives Rosalina(wolf)’s side a ginger hug while trying to catch his breath.
Maeve stomps the earring, unless someone stops her.
Regaldo is too tired to stop Maeve, fuck that earring.
Axle certainly doesn’t, hands still shaking from the fight.
Rosalina(wolf) is staying right by Regaldo’s side, and in wolf form for now, but she looks on at the earring and watches Maeve’s foot descend.
Regaldo stares off at something in the middle distance and gives a thumbs up with his burnt hand.
Maeve stomps. Then pulls her foot away, only to find the little earring glinting up smugly from the floor, completely unharmed.
Rosalina(wolf) retreats back before Regaldo shoots the thing.
Rosalina(wolf) chomps down on that earring, and still, it remains smug. And unbroken.
Sadly for the earring, Regaldo is out of ammo. So, he chucks his gun at it in pure GDR fashion
Rosalina(wolf) drops the earring back down in front of Regaldo just for that like Your Turn
Its almost like fate itself is also laughing as feet, and teeth, are ineffective. The earring looks almost too smug. Until Regaldo comes in, ready for his revenge. Wham! The gun slams down onto the earring. And the little thing explodes. Mist swirls up, forming, for a brief moment, a woman, screaming in a pyre. Misty shapes dance around the flames, their faces twisted in laughter as the woman’s mouth forms silent words…
Regaldo just stares blankly at where the earring once was, clearly dumbfounded. Then proceeds to go back to trying to pet Rosalina(wolf) as if she was the reason for his dumb luck.
And then the mist twists, tearing itself apart and dissipating back, forming two halves of the earring that fall to the ground.
Maeve pulls out a tiny plastic bag and scopps the halves into it, seals the bag, and tosses it in her backpack, as one does.
Maeve scoops, even
Staring at the earring, Axle mutters. “What… the fuck.” Then, he begins to laugh, laugh and laugh and laugh as he steps up to clap Regaldo on the back. “You crazy bastard!”
As the earring is scooped away, the chapel begins to dissolve. Mist tears away at last to reveal the inside of a trashed apartment, the floor stained red with blood in the shape of a fallen body
Maeve reaches out, fingertips brushing Axle’s arm, watching him, brows knit.
Reaching over, Axle catches Maeve’s fingers, giving them a squeeze.
Visible relief crosses Maeve’s face.
Fortunately, or not, depending on outlook, Regaldo seems to be mostly unscathed with the burns along his left arm and hand healing at a rate clearly beyond that of a normal human. He peels off some of the crispy skin only to let it fall to the ground while ambling over to reclaim his pistol. Turning, he gives the team a thumbs up. He draws his phone out of his pocket, tapping away at the screen as a neutral voice rings out, “Nicely done. I think I am done with random jewelry.”
Rosalina(wolf) bares her teeth and hunches down, fur bristling as she glares at the mist woman and growls her warning. She didn’t expect the ghost to just give up. But when it does and the two halves fall, she only stares for a second. Then she was about to pick the earring halves up in her maw herself like a helpful little helper, but Maeve wasn’t as stunned by it all. She huffs a wolven breath, and stretches down into that downward arch, then back up the other way. On this one her fur starts to separate, blood and ichors misting into in air in tiny puffs as skin cracks open, shifts around, and seals again repeatedly. Russet brown fur shuffles up her back, backing her gradually bald from back to front as bones crackle and crunch out of the old shapes and into the new. All the while the sounds of sloshing muscle and popping sinew can be heard ringing out as well, and if one looked into her mar or at her paws they’d easily see her toes splittings, growing, and widening before reforming into human digits, or her teeth falling out and being eaten while her human teeth grow in their place. She stands up naked as the day she was born after the change, and shameless in her smug look of victory over the witch of the song, and the earrings of doom.
“Lets…” Axle pauses, taking in a deep breath and chuckling. “Lets get out of here. I can’t hear that damn song anymore, and I’m happier for it.”
“Trinity better be paying well for this shit.” Axle adds.
Maeve laces her fingers into Axle’s, saying, “I’d like to clense that earring too, at home ideally.”
Regaldo holds out a fist towards Axle while nodding in agreement.
Bumping Regaldo’s fist with his free hand, Axle leads the way out of the apartment, leaving it and its dead to history.