51st of Spring, 495 AV
Late morning
Abase kicked his feet, pressing his arms forward through the water as he pulled himself through the gentle currents and wavering kelp. His hands grasped the long tendrils to aid himself through the water, kicking from the ground more often than actually swimming. With the beginings of his model started the previous day, Abase returned to attempt to refine it a bit. As he neared the spot where he had rested before, the Akontak looked around for his fishy friend, yet with a bit of disappointment he noticed that the little fish was no where to be seen. Scratching his head, Abase turned around in a circle, but he saw no other fish with which to use as reference either.
Well... I suppose I will work on it from memory for now. Though he suspected it would not be a fun, nor easy process.
Closing his eyes, Abase let his mind settle and calm, becoming loose and reflective like the water about him. He imagined the djed of his legs and feet just as he did before, twin points of light that pulsed with life. Running his hands over his legs, Abase imagined the mental hands tracing along the djed just as his physical hands moved along his legs. His hands moved a bit more easily than before as they began to pluck the strings of djed from either leg, and this time Abase plucked the threads from his upper thigh all the way down to his heals, saving himself the extra time it would take to do so later. Then, with the threads of djed wavering in his minds eye, Abase took the threads farthest up and began tying them together, pulling tight so that the two separate djed of the legs flowed together as close as possible. Abase continued this process of plucking, tying and tightening all the way down his legs until the two were connected as one. This entire process was accompanied by a strange pinching feeling that subsided to a dull itch as the final seems were fused into one. Even as he finished Abase could feel his djed wanting to revert back to normal, but pressing with his mind he held the transformation in place as he moved on.
Next Abase turned his attention to his feet. Rubbing his hands up and down the souls he used the mental fingers to press out the djed even as his physical ones did the same to his skin and tissue until the feet were flattened out to either side. He continued this for several chimes, working to make the fin as thin as possible while smoothing out the edges until they made two points of the bifurcated fin. With that done Abase turned his attention to the last part of his transformation. Running his hands down his legs, Abase imagined that at ever point that he touched a bead of djed rose up, overlaying one another all the way down to the base of the tail. From each bead Abase pulled the familiar shape of his own konti scales, placing a mental image of such scale over each bead of djed and molding, with his fingers and other items without, the djed around the image, making it take a similar shape until, finally, the process was complete.
Opening his eyes, Abase looked down at his finished creation. A long, tail form with what looked like flattened, pointy feet at the end. The only part that look relatively OK were the scales, and they all were the same green color of his skin and did not reflect like a normal scale would. With a sigh, and a cascade of bubbles, Abase scratched his head, wondering how to improve upon the design. The tail seemed too stubby, uniformly thick all the way to the fin, which was not how Abase remembered the fishes tail being. The fin as well seemed more like a paddle than a fin, and he could still see remnants of toes on the very edges.
The stitching that held his legs together threatened to come undone, but concentrating Abase strengthened his hold on the djed and kept it bound tightly in place. Already Abase was finding it hard to concentrate on keeping this form AND work on modifying it. Shaking his head, Abase ran his fingers along each side of the tail, pressing with his hands as well as his mind as he worked to streeeetch the djed and lengthen the tail. Beginning at the thigh Abase pressed his fingers against the scaled appendage, and beneath his fingers Abase could feel the tissue pressing longer, thinning out more and more as he moved his hands down the length of the tail. He was careful to ensure that the thigh was the thickest part of the tail, and that it tapered out into a relatively streamlined limb as it reached the fin. Frowning, Abase noticed that the stretch had displaced many of his scales, creating patches where there were no scales at all, and others that had too many. Pressing on these spots with his fingers, Abase deposited more little beads of djed, forming them into scales to fill in the space until a uniformity was repaired.
Taking a moment to repair a few of the seams which threatened to become loose, Abase looked at the fin, flipping in the water so that it was overhead so that he could expect it in better light. A simple, thin green paddle that tapered off to pointed ends, and little tiny toe nails along the outer edges. First thing was first, Abase wished to be rid of all semblance of feet. Smoothing over each toe individually, he worked the djed with his mental fingers as he pressed the toes out, filling them into the rest of the fin until there was nothing but a smooth edge. Then, satisfied, Abase looked at the fin as a whole. As before it still looked too much like skin, like feet. It did not have the translucent qualities that most fins had, and it was still too thick. Once more Abase took the fin between his hands, pressing on either side as he flattened out the fin further, summoning up images of a fishes fin as he did so in order to apply its qualities to his creation. Finally, with the translucent quality added, Abase rubbed his fingers along the edges of the fin, smoothing out wrinkles and tapering them off to graceful points until he was satisfied.
Twisting back around, Abase inspected his creation from all angles. From his hips the scaled appendage sloped gracefully down to its slenderest point at the fin. There the scales stopped, and the fin began and bifurcated in two. The strain of keeping the transformation in place was beginning to weigh upon Abase's mind, but he did not release his hold on the djed just yet. Rolling so that he faced into the kelp forest, Abase flicked his new tail experimentally and he found himself propelled forward quite suddenly, and out of control. Startled, Abase raised his hands before his eyes to block the kelp that slapped at him as he massed, and he laughed as he turned to look at his creation. It still required fine tuning, but he was getting closer! |
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