Return to Bowen.

Tearing her eyes away from the surprisingly arousing display of dominance, Aster whizzed back to Bowen's location, not daring to take her hands off her ears. Alighting on the rock, Bowen said something, giving her a grumpy look before frowning and mouthing: why are you covering your ears? Hesitantly dropping her hands Aster started to outline what she just saw. She got sidetracked a few times when it came to the physical descriptions of the sprites and Bowen's salivating reminded her to get back on track. When she finished Bowen cycled through a half-dozen confused looks before responding, "so... the sprites are mud-wrestling?" That's not quite how she put it but Aster nodded, "and... one of them, Mindy, drank from corruption?" Aster nodded, "and she grew a..." he pointed at his crotch. Aster gave an exasperated nod, "and then she got... mind control powers?"

"Well it sounds ridiculous when you put it like that." Aster huffed and paced back and forth on the rock, part of her squirming in horror at what she'd just seen and the rest squirming for different reasons, "Something was weird about her voice. It was like, when she said 'stop' everyone who heard her just... froze." Bowen frowned, "but not you?" Aster wearily rubbed her eyes, "I almost did, I was able to ignore it once I rationalized she wasn't talking to me." Bowen sat down and rested his head on his fist, looking deep in thought, "weird. Everyone who hears the command has to obey it... sort of like a Siren, huh?"

Aster looked at him incredulously, "How...? Why do you...?" He gave her a blank look, "Whatever. Yes, like a Siren. But that's just a myth... a really foreign and obscure myth that I don't understand how you know." He shrugs, "looks like there might be more truth to it than we thought. Besides, she's 'like' a Siren. She isn't actually a Siren."

Growing increasingly alarmed at both their situation and the unseen depths of Bowen's intellect, Aster paced nervously back and forth. The whole meadow was going to hell and they didn't even know why yet! The Tubes... they could follow them to their source! But what could they do once they arrived? It was her and Bowen against whatever terrible corruption that was sinking its talons into every fey in the meadow. They needed help... or a better approach.