Almandite

Almandite squints into the dark, but to no avail. Her partners are nowhere to be seen. “Where the fuuuuuu- heck did they go?!” She asks, pretty calmly if you ask her but rather angrily if you ask anyone else. Gods above, why did Patchwork and his brothers decide on making those episodes be PG? Why did Almandite even agree to this? She's not built for this at all!

Why did she think it would be a good idea to agree to sneaking into this abandoned condominium? The ghost town vibes are immense.

…Well, she knows why, because it sounded cool as all hell! And frankly, it still does. If only her goofball partners would stop messing with her and showed themselves already! She took her eyes off of them for one second!

The cameraman, showing his incredible dedication to the job, doesn't answer or react in any way.

“I should glue some windchimes on them… I wanna see how they would sneak away from me then.” She comments. Though she sounds harsh, it only comes from worry, and she taps her right claws quicker on the ground. This is fine. Both of them are very bright individuals, they will stand right out against the dark! Not to mention, Patchwork can easily escape if need be.

“Alright, nothing to it but to go looking for them… at least I got you, buddy.” The cameraman does not respond.

She sets off in a random direction. This place can't be too big! But yeesh, all those houses… are they all closed or open? It'll be a pain if she has to resort to looking inside each of them. The plan was only two or three!

Almandite keeps talking the whole time, not wanting to make the video boring, and also aware the viewers love to hear her voice whenever she does show up on their channel. But in not too long, she stops, fins flattening in mixture of concentration and nervousness. “You hear that?”

It sounds like… chewing? Like- like, some horrible ghost or rabid animal viciously tearing into… something, and eating it like they're starved. “Don't tell me this place is actually haunted…”

Despite that, Almandite can't find it in herself to be 100% scared. If ghosts ARE real… then they probably have something to do with her partners going missing. Which means she'll have to kick this ghost's butt!

Cautiously but determinedly, she approaches the back of the house here the sound is coming from. There, she sees a hunched figure, indeed looking to be eating something from a pile.

“HAH! Gotcha!” Almandite screams, ready to pounce, but the ghost lets out a startled sound, making her pause. That voice…

Sure enough, when it turns around, it turns out to actually be Transmission. Squinting her eyes even more in an attempt to make out what she is seeing, Almandite notices that Transmission seems to have his cheeks full. And, looking down, she can vaguely notice the pile seems to be full of strawberry and grape shaped objects.

“...How in the hell did you manage to sneak all of that in here.”

“Uh…” Transmission gulps everything in his mouth in one go, expression in what might be a sheepish look. It's too freaking dark for Almandite to really see anything clearly. “I have a lot of pockets?”

“No you do-”

Almandite is interrupted by something crashing behind her, and she turns around in a flash, fins raised to intimidate whoever or whatever is in there. And no, despite what film evidence says, she did not squeak or anything of the sort. It was merely… a cool and ironic scream. Yeah.

Once again, no ghost greets here, only another one of her partners. On top of two fallen trash cans, Patchwork looks up with a very similar expression. “Uh… Sorry. I mean! I meant to do that!” He laughs softly and scratches his head.

“...You two…” Almandite shakes her head, but it's pure fondness in her voice. “You almost scared me half to death! Why did you leave!

“I went after a cute rat I saw.” Transmission explains.

“And I thought I saw a dinosaur statue up ahead…”

Almandite states at them both for a second or two, before exploding into laughter. She can't be mad at them! She would do the exact same if she saw a frog or something.

For the third time today, a strange occurrence happens. The lights everywhere turn on and off repeatedly, making her stop abruptly.

“Well, that's terrifying!” Almandite says.

“Should we leave?” Transmission asks, not looking particularly worried.

“I'm already gone!” Patchwork said, opening up a portal and showing up a few feet already. “C'mon you three! Last one out is, uh… ghost food? Sorry. Last one out is something bad!”

“What the- give us a warning, you little cheater!” Almandite goes off after Patchwork, running full speed, while Transmission looks with longing at his pile of sweets.

He gets up eventually, going much more calmly after them. The cameraman will always be the last one in the file, so no need to worry, after all.

Almandite is a dragon with a bit of a short fuse but stay on her good side and she'll most likely be one of your best friends. With her booming laugh and slightly raspy voice, she has a way of lifting spirits around her, though if you ask Patchwork and Transmission, they'll tell you quite the opposite. Be careful what you say around her; she's always ready to kill for dragons she likes even a little bit, though whether she can or not is another story.

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