Encounterlogs
Nehas Odd Encounter Sr Rogier 241116
Neha's day off takes a turn for the bizarre when she suddenly falls victim to a hex, transforming her into a frog against her will. Initially enjoying the solace of her home, she is soon overwhelmed by an inexplicable heat and pressure, leading to painful changes that culminate in her losing consciousness. Upon waking, she finds herself in a most peculiar and unwelcome new form—trapped within the confines of her own clothing, no longer human but a frog with a green hue and webbed feet. Neha's attempts to adapt to this unexpected transformation are met with struggle and discomfort as she endeavors to navigate her once-familiar environment with her new, awkward frog body. Her journey from couch to kitchen, driven by an urgent need for moisture, showcases her quick wit and adaptability, despite the evident challenges and limitations of her flesh-formed state.
In a climactic quest for hydration, Neha's persistence and inventive problem-solving skills see her navigating the perilous landscape of her apartment with surprising agility for her new form. Utilizing her newfound frog abilities to stick and leap, she reaches her goal—a jug of water that promises respite from the unbearable dryness plaguing her. However, relief is short-lived as practical concerns about her survival and returning to her human form take precedence. With remarkable determination, Neha manages to summon help using her smartphone, despite the daunting task of navigating a touch screen with webbed feet. The arrival of the Templars offers a glimmer of hope, leading to a ritual that successfully reverses the hex. Neha's transformation back into a human, albeit a messy and somewhat embarrassing restoration, marks the end of her ordeal. With the immediate crisis averted, Neha is left to ponder the day's extraordinary events and the potential need for therapy to process the trauma of her involuntary amphibious adventure.
(Neha's odd encounter(SRRogier):SRRogier)
[Fri Nov 15 2024]
In a spacious, living room of timeless elegance
Deep, reddish tones of the mahogany wood flooring bring a sense of luxury and depth to the living area in its herringbone pattern. A neutral colour palette with a grey accent wall accentuates the rich tones of the leather furniture. The large room is illuminated by contemporary fixtures sunk into the ceiling, and an antique, Edwardian-style floor lamp adds a softer, more ambient glow.
It is morning, about 32F(0C) degrees, and the sky is covered by grey clouds.
(Your target has been hexed and transformed into an animal against their will. Unable to turn back they need to try to find allies who can understand their problem and find a way to undo the curse.
)
Hopefully Neha's been enjoying her day off so far. Vegging out on the couch is surely a time-honoured tradition of those spared responsibility, even if only for a little while, but woe to the poor doctor if her father or her family were to spot her being so utterly unproductive. Netflix seeks to claim a tithe of her time, of course, and demands she browse the many godawful options in its catalogue before it shows her anything of substance. Likely she'll spend as much time picking her show as she will actually watching it.
Or maybe not. It's supposed to be freezing out there, but a sudden flush of warmth blooms upon her skin - pleasant for a few seconds, then quickly outstaying its welcome. Any other warmth would be preferable - the false warmth of alcohol, the lurid warmth of arousal, the cozy warmth of a blanket burrito... But Neha's subject to a peppery warmth, like a fever that wants her to wriggle out of her skin. Her clothes tickle against her skin, begging for her to strip down, rip them off if she has to - rip her whole skin off, maybe. God, it's starting to hurt. The TV remote slips from her grip as her fingers tighten into a fist, unbidden, muscles seizing and contracting against her instructions. And below it, an itchy feeling, like sparklers being set off beneath her skin. Imperfect, but not dissimilar to the feeling of fleshforming...
But this couldn't be that, could it? She had Sanctuary. And proper fleshforming felt more like a cursed fire than this... fizzling. In fact - she might be able to fight off whatever this is, with her own abilities. That might occupy her too much for whoever's /doing/ this to her to be properly handled, though...
Neha's eyes begin to throb and water as pressure builds from within, invisible hands of searing heat pressing in against her skull from all directions, trying to shape her smaller and smaller. This certainly isn't fleshforming... which means it's probably magic. Hateful, body-twisting magic, inferior to proper fleshforming... but her fingers won't open yet. The surprise assault leaves her on the back foot.
There was definitely something playing on the screen, but Neha probably wouldn't be able to recall any of the plot at gunpoint. It's just something to fill the silence while she turns her brain off, just relaxing for one day before she goes back to the busy-ness of the clinic and the upcoming, ever-dreaded full moon that always turns activity in the emergency ward up a notch.
Neha is used to the winters of New York, and the comforts of a heated house. Her first thought, of course, is that it might be the heating malfunctioning, which would be a pain in the ass if so, considering how much of the apartment still needs fixing-upping and how perpetually-broke she seems to be. It's only when Neha musters up the courage to sit up straight so she can find the source of the heat that, her fingers going to tug at the neck of her sweater to pull it away from her flushed skin. She knows better than to take it /off/, though, rightfully alarmed at the sudden change of temperature. Hopefully she's not falling sick...
Neha may be a fleshformer, but she's got little experience with magic, and less experience still with shapeshifting magic. She puts up some cursory attempt to stave off the pressure that builds up around her, teeth gritted and hands going to press against her temples, fingers clenched still, and a keening, pained cry fills the air as Neha's eyes water.
"Stop," she tells whoever it might be, just trying to breathe through the waves of pain as they ebb and flow, and she stumbles her way to her feet, attempting to make her way back over to her bedroom, and all her kits of First Aid and other medication in there.
Neha's request - instruction, really - goes unanswered. The heat continues to niggle and tooth at her skin, and the pressure on her skull is unbearable. Without her actively fleshforming herself back into proper human form, the magic overwhelms her mid-stride, well before she can reach the kitchen. Spastic legs and feet refuse to heed her besieged mind's locomotive instructions; she collapses to the ground as they begin to kick and fit in place. All control flees her. Her muscles stiffen, flex, relax; stiffen, flex, relax. The academic part of her mind might identify the symptoms of a tonic-clonic seizure, or grand mal... but she remains conscious. Conscious through the agonising pain of having her entire nervous system burn at once, where every inch of her skin comes alive with sensation. The most sensitive areas of her body suffer the worst, as if acid is ripping through her lips, her fingers, her eyes - the sensation does not become any more pleasant where it scours the erogenous zones. The pounding pressure in her skull intensifies, and intensifies, and intensifies, and finally her skull gives, and darkness consumes her.
Neha awakens in a pool of her own clothing, drenched in the once-familiar, human scent that she'd suffused them with. It feels wrong now, though. That's the smell of a big, probably predatory animal. A mammal; the kind of thing to chase you down on four legs and rip your stomach out. The heat's faded, at least... but her skin feels desperately dry. So do her eyes - she can't blink them. She can't do much at all, actually, other than try to dig herself out of her jeans and her sweater, and maybe take stock of whatever she'd been turned into.
Oh. Well, shit, maybe Neha should've gone and fleshformed herself back to normal after all. It's really just that... well, it's painful, and Neha isn't the biggest fan of painful. Especially the being-burnt by hot sugar syrup sort of painful her fleshforming tends to be. It's a matter to handle very carefully and when she's in the right mind and not getting slowly steamed to death like a frog in a pot of water.
Speaking of which - she's not turning into a frog, right? Hopefully not. Neha doesn't have time to linger upon it for too long; she collapses upon the ground, and then, well, maybe there /is/ time to linger upon it after all, but she's too busy feeling like she's dying and oh dear God she would have bore the pain of fleshforming if it meant she wouldn't be going through /this/. Her mouth would open in a scream if she had the muscular control over herself to do so - she doesn't, so all she can do is lie there and take it, the waves of agony washing over her, unending, unebbing, unceasing, like the tide of an ocean beating against the cliffside and weathering it away, bit by bit by bit by...
When Neha wakes, at least she has the comfort of not being in pain anymore. She wiggles. Just a bit. Surely she can do wiggling.
Some wiggling is well within the realm of possibility. Neha has four legs, a head... some webbed feet... she /is/ a frog. God damnit. And that dryness in her eyes isn't going away. She's dissected enough frogs to know they have certain other methods of closing their eyes. Third eyelids... eyeballs sinking back down into their throats when they swallow... all the fun stuff. It probably will not be very fun to experience that for the first time, but dry eyes are a real pain in the ass, too. Her skin's not much better off, but maybe she could jump into the kitchen sink... or the toilet.
In summary, yeah, she really should have just fought things off with her fleshforming. Not many others could have fought off a forced transformation to begin with. But that's all in the past, now. Now's the time for Neha's froggy future. She's so /weak/, though - the weight of the denim and fleece is enough to pose a serious obstacle for her. This is going to take some figuring out. At least all of her intellect somehow survived its transition into a frog brain. Clearly, some instincts have found their way in there - that human smell really is quite offensive, despite being her own - but she still feels pretty much like herself.
Noooo, not a frog. The one thing Neha did not wish to go through. Truly, she suffers the worst fate of all. She couldn't even be fleshformed into something cute, like a cat or a dog or a little bird. Being a bird would be nice, if she could fly.
Maybe next time.
For now, Neha's got bigger things to worry about, like that dryness in her eyes and the discomfort of this new form. Presumably her vision is quite stellar if she's able to figure out her form beneath the heaviness of the sweater and her new-too-large jeans, and she attempts to hop her way out from beneath. Hoppity hop hop. She can totally do this.
This reminds Neha of that image she'd seen recently of a frog with eyeballs inside its mouth, and she shudders a frog-ly shudder. Thankfully her eyes are where they're supposed to be, right on her head. She makes an attempt at closing them without /closing/ closing them. Like closing them with benefits. Maybe that will help.
She also makes an attempt at hopping her way to the kitchen. Even if the first hop has managed to free her from her clothing, the second sends her stumbling down onto the ground, and the third makes her bump into the couch, and woah, she's a little dizzy. It's going to take a while to get used to this...
A transparent, nictitating membrane tugs partially across her eyes, sluggardly and slow. It doesn't bring much relief, but it does give her a foothold into figuring out how the rest of her new body parts work. Moving her limbs works mostly without issue, though she might have to get a few dud hops out of the way before she figures out how to best launch herself with force... but it works. Her tongue, though? Her eyes? Her ranine new body didn't come with an instruction manual, unfortunately, and some trial and error will be necessary.
Hip hop, hippety hop. It's not so bad, once Neha gets a little more used to it. But /god/ she's dry. Her instincts scream at her to find some god damn moisture as a matter of highest priority. And to blink, god damnit, or she'll go blind. Just gotta... figure out how, with the way her new skull works. It's going to take some force. The dizziness doesn't help with figuring out the intricacies of being a frog, though, so her approach to the kitchen is going to look a bit drunken no matter what. In the light, she can see her skin is a bright, deep green, and the webbing between her fingers is a waxy yellow. She's an American green tree frog. And she's a chunky one, too, despite having been a fairly skinny young woman. How unflattering.
Hip hop has never been her favorite genre to rock out to. Ha ha, rock. Neha only lets herself be distracted for 0.3 seconds with the internal joke, and then she's making another attempt to hop out into the kitchen. Plap, plap, plap, she hits the floor with each hop - it's really just as simple as jumping like a human and then praying to all the gods she knows before she hits the ground. The gods have yet to look upon her favorably.
Neha's goal isn't the kitchen sink - she can't really operate a tap right now. Nope, her goal is the jug of water sat upon the kitchen table, waiting for her to dive in and make herself at home. Whenever she can make her way to it... the path is perilous, but she sees hope - all she has to do is hop to a stool, and then hop onto the counter, and then jump all the way across to the table and into the jug. Easy. She can do this.
Right?
Is it too late to try her hand at fleshforming?
Whether it's too late to try fleshforming or not can only really be discovered with an actual attempt. In theory, plenty of fleshformed creatures retain their capacity to fleshform. However, Neha's without any fingers right now, and fucking up while fleshforming herself might end up /very/ badly.
She's welcome to try.
In the safer vein of things she finds herself quite adept at climbing her way up the counter. Her feet prove delightfully adept at sticking to things, even with skin as parched as hers. She can pretend to be Spider Man for a minute, in a froggy way. Even with her weakened form, her body weight is /nothing/. She can lug herself around no problem. Ahead, she sees the Water Jug. Delightful moisture, so near, but so far.
She'd probably be better off /not/ trying to fleshform while trapped within a glass jug, though.
So the good thing about it is, if Neha fleshforms her eyes into her throat on accident, she can just... fleshform them back the right way. Right? She's a genius.
She's also absolutely not going to try any of that right now. Right now, her focus is just on getting to the jug of water. Moisturization awaits. She's never cared about skincare so much in her life before this very moment. She can almost smell it, feel it, /taste/ it. Her tongue darts out, fluwrup, back in.
Huh, weird. Neha didn't know her tongue did that.
No time to get distracted, though. She refocuses on what matters right now, putting aside the weird little questions at the back of her head so she can get prepared for one giant leap, a skip and a hop and a- PEW, she goes, from the floor and upon the stool, gripping at the leather with her hands. She better not be leaving froggy slime all over her apartment for her human form to clean up later on. Ugh. The /plop/ with which she lands doesn't sound promising though.
Anyway, step one out of the way, she next moves on to step two, the counter. Plop, hop, plop, plop, plop. Is that a fly buzzing around?
Absolutely not. It's freezing out; no flies buzz about for convenient froggy snacking. That buzzing's her phone, vibrating in the pocket of her jeans. It's her day off, so hopefully it's just someone texting her and not her being urgently called back to save poor Timmy from a rare and deadly blood disease that only Neha had the expertise to treat in time. Boston's not that far away, anyway. Surely they could handle it. Slime's not a big deal either, because she's so god damn parched. Hopefully she doesn't end up trapped in this jug. There's no bottleneck to block her way out, right? No funny twists or bends? Because that would be a /very/ lame way to die.
Hopefully it's not someone Neha actually wanted to talk to; she'd finally gotten the time to answer some of her texts today and she'd been looking forward to meeting up with friends at some point instead of just spending day-in and day-out at work trying to patch people up only for them to come back all beat up again by whatever new monster someone decides to dream up in Haven.
Deep breaths, deep breaths. Neha can do this. She's got this. She's not a quitter; she's made her way through six years of schooling and fuck if she's going to die like this, drowned in a jug of water in her own kitchen. Nope, not Neha.
There's no funny twists or bends. There's just water in a regular, round-rimmed jug, which goes splashing in a circumference around it upon the table when Neha next hops and lands /right/ in the jug.
That definitely wasn't the intent - Neha had been aiming to land next to it, and then jump again into it, but hey, maybe she's better at this froggy life than she'd thought.
And, more importantly for now: cool, moisturizing water.
Landing where she didn't intend to is more a sign of her inexperience, but whatever copium the frog might like to huff about its hopping skill is entirely her own prerogative. By god, that water feels good, though. It soothes Neha's froggy skin and relaxes membranes which had begun to stiffen. Her third eyelids slam shut by instinct, protecting her eyes while allowing them to see through the transparent film. She can't quite breathe down here, but the water feels so good she might wish she'd been turned into a fish instead.
Right, finally, the first box on her list can be checked off. Now - she probably should find some way to turn back into a human. Fleshforming might work - that was kind of fundamental. Otherwise, well, she'd been cursed into a frog. Maybe she needed a good old fashioned smooch from a passing princess? Perchance the frog might find need to discover what else her tongue can do, in order to reclaim her old body. Who'd done this, anyway? Maybe there are clues somewhere for her to find. Many an avenue to seek a de-cursing, but they all begin with having got herself nice and moist.
Neha does not wish to leave her Jug of Moist and Container of All Good Things anytime soon.
... except, well, it's kind of cold, isn't it? And her body doesn't seem to have gotten the memo to start warming her back up. Such are the demerits of cold-bloodedness.
Neha gets out of her Jug of Moist. Alas. Alack.
She's got an Idea in mind, though. Now that she's kind of maybe figured out how to blink, and has some minor experience in hopping around, she's going to try and hop her way back to the living room, and--
Woah, the ground is far away. Hopefully she's light enough that she doesn't just go splat. Still, Neha is careful, just in case, and she starts the slow journey back. If she can make it to her phone and manage to operate it with her webbed paws, maybe she can find a number to send a distress call out to. Irene would be a good option, surely. She can rely on the Templar. She's not going to attempt fleshforming herself just yet when there's other options available.
While many frogs simply do not have a terminal velocity sufficient for properly injuring themselves from a fall, it's hard to say for sure that such a thing applies to Neha. She's a chunky frog, after all. Thankfully, even damp, she remains the most expert of climbers. Her grippers can really, really grip. And the phone's touchscreen should be usable in froggy form, too! She just has to get the damn thing out of the pocket of her jeans. That's going to be a real pain in the ass. Can't dial-a-Templar without access to the phone...
The grip do be gripping, and Neha hippity hops her way out to the living room once more. Her clothes are where she'd left them of course, bundled up into a pile of stuff on the floor where she'd fallen unconscious what seems like ages ago - is it just her, or does time seem to move so much faster when she's this small? Maybe it's because she has to spend ages just trying to figure out how to walk - or, well, hop and how not to get herself killed, and ugh her clothes still smell weird. There's that human smell on them that makes her instinctively want to stay away, but Neha wrangles her brain back into submission and approaches closer. Closer, closer, closer still, so she can try her best to nudge at her phone. This is going to take a long, long time.
It's not so hard to touch the phone, or even to get a good grip on it - these things are relatively achievable with the application of a little human intellect and cutesy pluck. Dedication will handle the rest of it, though it takes her a good twenty minutes to tug the whole thing free. All her power's in her back legs, and she can take advantage of that in ways most frogs can't. Thank god it's a Galaxy, even if it's old. These guys don't need any mechanical button presses to unlock. Her sticky toepads become an inconvenience once it comes time to manipulate a touchscreen, but Neha's rather pressing motivation sees her through without too much issue, and while Irene's phone in particular isn't reachable, the local Templarate hotline is.
An hour later, two templars tote poor Neha around as a glassy-eyed arcanist sweeps the house with rote, mechanical action. A tracing ritual is performed on the frog before they'll fix her, so they know whose butt to kick for assaulting an innocent human - and finally, at the end of it all, the chipped arcanist spills a little more of their blood into one of Neha's bowls - quite a bit of blood, actually; enough to submerge the frog in for a proper, appearance-restoring bloodbath.
The transformation back into a human is significantly less unpleasant than it had been the other way around, though facing a room full of Templars with nothing to cover her except smears of someone else's blood is no fun. Still; freedom is freedom, and the Templars have seen it all before. When they leave, all Neha needs to consider is what else she might get up to with her day off and how much do therapists cost around here?
In a climactic quest for hydration, Neha's persistence and inventive problem-solving skills see her navigating the perilous landscape of her apartment with surprising agility for her new form. Utilizing her newfound frog abilities to stick and leap, she reaches her goal—a jug of water that promises respite from the unbearable dryness plaguing her. However, relief is short-lived as practical concerns about her survival and returning to her human form take precedence. With remarkable determination, Neha manages to summon help using her smartphone, despite the daunting task of navigating a touch screen with webbed feet. The arrival of the Templars offers a glimmer of hope, leading to a ritual that successfully reverses the hex. Neha's transformation back into a human, albeit a messy and somewhat embarrassing restoration, marks the end of her ordeal. With the immediate crisis averted, Neha is left to ponder the day's extraordinary events and the potential need for therapy to process the trauma of her involuntary amphibious adventure.
(Neha's odd encounter(SRRogier):SRRogier)
[Fri Nov 15 2024]
In a spacious, living room of timeless elegance
Deep, reddish tones of the mahogany wood flooring bring a sense of luxury and depth to the living area in its herringbone pattern. A neutral colour palette with a grey accent wall accentuates the rich tones of the leather furniture. The large room is illuminated by contemporary fixtures sunk into the ceiling, and an antique, Edwardian-style floor lamp adds a softer, more ambient glow.
It is morning, about 32F(0C) degrees, and the sky is covered by grey clouds.
(Your target has been hexed and transformed into an animal against their will. Unable to turn back they need to try to find allies who can understand their problem and find a way to undo the curse.
)
Hopefully Neha's been enjoying her day off so far. Vegging out on the couch is surely a time-honoured tradition of those spared responsibility, even if only for a little while, but woe to the poor doctor if her father or her family were to spot her being so utterly unproductive. Netflix seeks to claim a tithe of her time, of course, and demands she browse the many godawful options in its catalogue before it shows her anything of substance. Likely she'll spend as much time picking her show as she will actually watching it.
Or maybe not. It's supposed to be freezing out there, but a sudden flush of warmth blooms upon her skin - pleasant for a few seconds, then quickly outstaying its welcome. Any other warmth would be preferable - the false warmth of alcohol, the lurid warmth of arousal, the cozy warmth of a blanket burrito... But Neha's subject to a peppery warmth, like a fever that wants her to wriggle out of her skin. Her clothes tickle against her skin, begging for her to strip down, rip them off if she has to - rip her whole skin off, maybe. God, it's starting to hurt. The TV remote slips from her grip as her fingers tighten into a fist, unbidden, muscles seizing and contracting against her instructions. And below it, an itchy feeling, like sparklers being set off beneath her skin. Imperfect, but not dissimilar to the feeling of fleshforming...
But this couldn't be that, could it? She had Sanctuary. And proper fleshforming felt more like a cursed fire than this... fizzling. In fact - she might be able to fight off whatever this is, with her own abilities. That might occupy her too much for whoever's /doing/ this to her to be properly handled, though...
Neha's eyes begin to throb and water as pressure builds from within, invisible hands of searing heat pressing in against her skull from all directions, trying to shape her smaller and smaller. This certainly isn't fleshforming... which means it's probably magic. Hateful, body-twisting magic, inferior to proper fleshforming... but her fingers won't open yet. The surprise assault leaves her on the back foot.
There was definitely something playing on the screen, but Neha probably wouldn't be able to recall any of the plot at gunpoint. It's just something to fill the silence while she turns her brain off, just relaxing for one day before she goes back to the busy-ness of the clinic and the upcoming, ever-dreaded full moon that always turns activity in the emergency ward up a notch.
Neha is used to the winters of New York, and the comforts of a heated house. Her first thought, of course, is that it might be the heating malfunctioning, which would be a pain in the ass if so, considering how much of the apartment still needs fixing-upping and how perpetually-broke she seems to be. It's only when Neha musters up the courage to sit up straight so she can find the source of the heat that, her fingers going to tug at the neck of her sweater to pull it away from her flushed skin. She knows better than to take it /off/, though, rightfully alarmed at the sudden change of temperature. Hopefully she's not falling sick...
Neha may be a fleshformer, but she's got little experience with magic, and less experience still with shapeshifting magic. She puts up some cursory attempt to stave off the pressure that builds up around her, teeth gritted and hands going to press against her temples, fingers clenched still, and a keening, pained cry fills the air as Neha's eyes water.
"Stop," she tells whoever it might be, just trying to breathe through the waves of pain as they ebb and flow, and she stumbles her way to her feet, attempting to make her way back over to her bedroom, and all her kits of First Aid and other medication in there.
Neha's request - instruction, really - goes unanswered. The heat continues to niggle and tooth at her skin, and the pressure on her skull is unbearable. Without her actively fleshforming herself back into proper human form, the magic overwhelms her mid-stride, well before she can reach the kitchen. Spastic legs and feet refuse to heed her besieged mind's locomotive instructions; she collapses to the ground as they begin to kick and fit in place. All control flees her. Her muscles stiffen, flex, relax; stiffen, flex, relax. The academic part of her mind might identify the symptoms of a tonic-clonic seizure, or grand mal... but she remains conscious. Conscious through the agonising pain of having her entire nervous system burn at once, where every inch of her skin comes alive with sensation. The most sensitive areas of her body suffer the worst, as if acid is ripping through her lips, her fingers, her eyes - the sensation does not become any more pleasant where it scours the erogenous zones. The pounding pressure in her skull intensifies, and intensifies, and intensifies, and finally her skull gives, and darkness consumes her.
Neha awakens in a pool of her own clothing, drenched in the once-familiar, human scent that she'd suffused them with. It feels wrong now, though. That's the smell of a big, probably predatory animal. A mammal; the kind of thing to chase you down on four legs and rip your stomach out. The heat's faded, at least... but her skin feels desperately dry. So do her eyes - she can't blink them. She can't do much at all, actually, other than try to dig herself out of her jeans and her sweater, and maybe take stock of whatever she'd been turned into.
Oh. Well, shit, maybe Neha should've gone and fleshformed herself back to normal after all. It's really just that... well, it's painful, and Neha isn't the biggest fan of painful. Especially the being-burnt by hot sugar syrup sort of painful her fleshforming tends to be. It's a matter to handle very carefully and when she's in the right mind and not getting slowly steamed to death like a frog in a pot of water.
Speaking of which - she's not turning into a frog, right? Hopefully not. Neha doesn't have time to linger upon it for too long; she collapses upon the ground, and then, well, maybe there /is/ time to linger upon it after all, but she's too busy feeling like she's dying and oh dear God she would have bore the pain of fleshforming if it meant she wouldn't be going through /this/. Her mouth would open in a scream if she had the muscular control over herself to do so - she doesn't, so all she can do is lie there and take it, the waves of agony washing over her, unending, unebbing, unceasing, like the tide of an ocean beating against the cliffside and weathering it away, bit by bit by bit by...
When Neha wakes, at least she has the comfort of not being in pain anymore. She wiggles. Just a bit. Surely she can do wiggling.
Some wiggling is well within the realm of possibility. Neha has four legs, a head... some webbed feet... she /is/ a frog. God damnit. And that dryness in her eyes isn't going away. She's dissected enough frogs to know they have certain other methods of closing their eyes. Third eyelids... eyeballs sinking back down into their throats when they swallow... all the fun stuff. It probably will not be very fun to experience that for the first time, but dry eyes are a real pain in the ass, too. Her skin's not much better off, but maybe she could jump into the kitchen sink... or the toilet.
In summary, yeah, she really should have just fought things off with her fleshforming. Not many others could have fought off a forced transformation to begin with. But that's all in the past, now. Now's the time for Neha's froggy future. She's so /weak/, though - the weight of the denim and fleece is enough to pose a serious obstacle for her. This is going to take some figuring out. At least all of her intellect somehow survived its transition into a frog brain. Clearly, some instincts have found their way in there - that human smell really is quite offensive, despite being her own - but she still feels pretty much like herself.
Noooo, not a frog. The one thing Neha did not wish to go through. Truly, she suffers the worst fate of all. She couldn't even be fleshformed into something cute, like a cat or a dog or a little bird. Being a bird would be nice, if she could fly.
Maybe next time.
For now, Neha's got bigger things to worry about, like that dryness in her eyes and the discomfort of this new form. Presumably her vision is quite stellar if she's able to figure out her form beneath the heaviness of the sweater and her new-too-large jeans, and she attempts to hop her way out from beneath. Hoppity hop hop. She can totally do this.
This reminds Neha of that image she'd seen recently of a frog with eyeballs inside its mouth, and she shudders a frog-ly shudder. Thankfully her eyes are where they're supposed to be, right on her head. She makes an attempt at closing them without /closing/ closing them. Like closing them with benefits. Maybe that will help.
She also makes an attempt at hopping her way to the kitchen. Even if the first hop has managed to free her from her clothing, the second sends her stumbling down onto the ground, and the third makes her bump into the couch, and woah, she's a little dizzy. It's going to take a while to get used to this...
A transparent, nictitating membrane tugs partially across her eyes, sluggardly and slow. It doesn't bring much relief, but it does give her a foothold into figuring out how the rest of her new body parts work. Moving her limbs works mostly without issue, though she might have to get a few dud hops out of the way before she figures out how to best launch herself with force... but it works. Her tongue, though? Her eyes? Her ranine new body didn't come with an instruction manual, unfortunately, and some trial and error will be necessary.
Hip hop, hippety hop. It's not so bad, once Neha gets a little more used to it. But /god/ she's dry. Her instincts scream at her to find some god damn moisture as a matter of highest priority. And to blink, god damnit, or she'll go blind. Just gotta... figure out how, with the way her new skull works. It's going to take some force. The dizziness doesn't help with figuring out the intricacies of being a frog, though, so her approach to the kitchen is going to look a bit drunken no matter what. In the light, she can see her skin is a bright, deep green, and the webbing between her fingers is a waxy yellow. She's an American green tree frog. And she's a chunky one, too, despite having been a fairly skinny young woman. How unflattering.
Hip hop has never been her favorite genre to rock out to. Ha ha, rock. Neha only lets herself be distracted for 0.3 seconds with the internal joke, and then she's making another attempt to hop out into the kitchen. Plap, plap, plap, she hits the floor with each hop - it's really just as simple as jumping like a human and then praying to all the gods she knows before she hits the ground. The gods have yet to look upon her favorably.
Neha's goal isn't the kitchen sink - she can't really operate a tap right now. Nope, her goal is the jug of water sat upon the kitchen table, waiting for her to dive in and make herself at home. Whenever she can make her way to it... the path is perilous, but she sees hope - all she has to do is hop to a stool, and then hop onto the counter, and then jump all the way across to the table and into the jug. Easy. She can do this.
Right?
Is it too late to try her hand at fleshforming?
Whether it's too late to try fleshforming or not can only really be discovered with an actual attempt. In theory, plenty of fleshformed creatures retain their capacity to fleshform. However, Neha's without any fingers right now, and fucking up while fleshforming herself might end up /very/ badly.
She's welcome to try.
In the safer vein of things she finds herself quite adept at climbing her way up the counter. Her feet prove delightfully adept at sticking to things, even with skin as parched as hers. She can pretend to be Spider Man for a minute, in a froggy way. Even with her weakened form, her body weight is /nothing/. She can lug herself around no problem. Ahead, she sees the Water Jug. Delightful moisture, so near, but so far.
She'd probably be better off /not/ trying to fleshform while trapped within a glass jug, though.
So the good thing about it is, if Neha fleshforms her eyes into her throat on accident, she can just... fleshform them back the right way. Right? She's a genius.
She's also absolutely not going to try any of that right now. Right now, her focus is just on getting to the jug of water. Moisturization awaits. She's never cared about skincare so much in her life before this very moment. She can almost smell it, feel it, /taste/ it. Her tongue darts out, fluwrup, back in.
Huh, weird. Neha didn't know her tongue did that.
No time to get distracted, though. She refocuses on what matters right now, putting aside the weird little questions at the back of her head so she can get prepared for one giant leap, a skip and a hop and a- PEW, she goes, from the floor and upon the stool, gripping at the leather with her hands. She better not be leaving froggy slime all over her apartment for her human form to clean up later on. Ugh. The /plop/ with which she lands doesn't sound promising though.
Anyway, step one out of the way, she next moves on to step two, the counter. Plop, hop, plop, plop, plop. Is that a fly buzzing around?
Absolutely not. It's freezing out; no flies buzz about for convenient froggy snacking. That buzzing's her phone, vibrating in the pocket of her jeans. It's her day off, so hopefully it's just someone texting her and not her being urgently called back to save poor Timmy from a rare and deadly blood disease that only Neha had the expertise to treat in time. Boston's not that far away, anyway. Surely they could handle it. Slime's not a big deal either, because she's so god damn parched. Hopefully she doesn't end up trapped in this jug. There's no bottleneck to block her way out, right? No funny twists or bends? Because that would be a /very/ lame way to die.
Hopefully it's not someone Neha actually wanted to talk to; she'd finally gotten the time to answer some of her texts today and she'd been looking forward to meeting up with friends at some point instead of just spending day-in and day-out at work trying to patch people up only for them to come back all beat up again by whatever new monster someone decides to dream up in Haven.
Deep breaths, deep breaths. Neha can do this. She's got this. She's not a quitter; she's made her way through six years of schooling and fuck if she's going to die like this, drowned in a jug of water in her own kitchen. Nope, not Neha.
There's no funny twists or bends. There's just water in a regular, round-rimmed jug, which goes splashing in a circumference around it upon the table when Neha next hops and lands /right/ in the jug.
That definitely wasn't the intent - Neha had been aiming to land next to it, and then jump again into it, but hey, maybe she's better at this froggy life than she'd thought.
And, more importantly for now: cool, moisturizing water.
Landing where she didn't intend to is more a sign of her inexperience, but whatever copium the frog might like to huff about its hopping skill is entirely her own prerogative. By god, that water feels good, though. It soothes Neha's froggy skin and relaxes membranes which had begun to stiffen. Her third eyelids slam shut by instinct, protecting her eyes while allowing them to see through the transparent film. She can't quite breathe down here, but the water feels so good she might wish she'd been turned into a fish instead.
Right, finally, the first box on her list can be checked off. Now - she probably should find some way to turn back into a human. Fleshforming might work - that was kind of fundamental. Otherwise, well, she'd been cursed into a frog. Maybe she needed a good old fashioned smooch from a passing princess? Perchance the frog might find need to discover what else her tongue can do, in order to reclaim her old body. Who'd done this, anyway? Maybe there are clues somewhere for her to find. Many an avenue to seek a de-cursing, but they all begin with having got herself nice and moist.
Neha does not wish to leave her Jug of Moist and Container of All Good Things anytime soon.
... except, well, it's kind of cold, isn't it? And her body doesn't seem to have gotten the memo to start warming her back up. Such are the demerits of cold-bloodedness.
Neha gets out of her Jug of Moist. Alas. Alack.
She's got an Idea in mind, though. Now that she's kind of maybe figured out how to blink, and has some minor experience in hopping around, she's going to try and hop her way back to the living room, and--
Woah, the ground is far away. Hopefully she's light enough that she doesn't just go splat. Still, Neha is careful, just in case, and she starts the slow journey back. If she can make it to her phone and manage to operate it with her webbed paws, maybe she can find a number to send a distress call out to. Irene would be a good option, surely. She can rely on the Templar. She's not going to attempt fleshforming herself just yet when there's other options available.
While many frogs simply do not have a terminal velocity sufficient for properly injuring themselves from a fall, it's hard to say for sure that such a thing applies to Neha. She's a chunky frog, after all. Thankfully, even damp, she remains the most expert of climbers. Her grippers can really, really grip. And the phone's touchscreen should be usable in froggy form, too! She just has to get the damn thing out of the pocket of her jeans. That's going to be a real pain in the ass. Can't dial-a-Templar without access to the phone...
The grip do be gripping, and Neha hippity hops her way out to the living room once more. Her clothes are where she'd left them of course, bundled up into a pile of stuff on the floor where she'd fallen unconscious what seems like ages ago - is it just her, or does time seem to move so much faster when she's this small? Maybe it's because she has to spend ages just trying to figure out how to walk - or, well, hop and how not to get herself killed, and ugh her clothes still smell weird. There's that human smell on them that makes her instinctively want to stay away, but Neha wrangles her brain back into submission and approaches closer. Closer, closer, closer still, so she can try her best to nudge at her phone. This is going to take a long, long time.
It's not so hard to touch the phone, or even to get a good grip on it - these things are relatively achievable with the application of a little human intellect and cutesy pluck. Dedication will handle the rest of it, though it takes her a good twenty minutes to tug the whole thing free. All her power's in her back legs, and she can take advantage of that in ways most frogs can't. Thank god it's a Galaxy, even if it's old. These guys don't need any mechanical button presses to unlock. Her sticky toepads become an inconvenience once it comes time to manipulate a touchscreen, but Neha's rather pressing motivation sees her through without too much issue, and while Irene's phone in particular isn't reachable, the local Templarate hotline is.
An hour later, two templars tote poor Neha around as a glassy-eyed arcanist sweeps the house with rote, mechanical action. A tracing ritual is performed on the frog before they'll fix her, so they know whose butt to kick for assaulting an innocent human - and finally, at the end of it all, the chipped arcanist spills a little more of their blood into one of Neha's bowls - quite a bit of blood, actually; enough to submerge the frog in for a proper, appearance-restoring bloodbath.
The transformation back into a human is significantly less unpleasant than it had been the other way around, though facing a room full of Templars with nothing to cover her except smears of someone else's blood is no fun. Still; freedom is freedom, and the Templars have seen it all before. When they leave, all Neha needs to consider is what else she might get up to with her day off and how much do therapists cost around here?