The Labyrinth

She flashes her eyes at him, pupils elongating into vertical slits. Though it may not be a familiar reaction to any of them it's obviously a kind of threat display in this context.

Why did I choose a weakling like you? the voice rings in her mind.

He didn't trust Behemoth in the slightest, but the dragon had a point: Viper looked like she was on the verge of a panic attack. There was the small problem of him not knowing how to deal with one. He had never really been close to someone who had them, so the little he had to go on was from the internet? (Namely fanfiction, but, hey, the writers of those did their research. If that was the only information he could use right now, then so be it.)

Oz turned to Viper. "I'm not sure how much this will actually help, but I think Behemoth is right - you really look like you're about to have a panic attack." He thought for a moment, trying to recall what he had read. "I've heard that breathing exercises work? Like breathing in for four seconds, holding for seven and then letting out for eight." He gave her a warm, genuine smile. He didn't need to act right now, even though her eyes were doing a weird slit thing. "Maybe that would help you?"

Behemoth watched silently as Oz made an attempt to calm to frightened woman. His eyes slightly narrowed as he saw her pupils turn to slits. He knew what that looked like - it was like a snake's eyes. Clearly, this human was not just so.

With a quiet sniff, he smelled her from afar, picking up her scent. First; fear. Then the smell of a human, a dingy room, blood that was not her own, and a chemical he couldn't recognize, but it vaguely reminded him of smoke. Then... there was the smell of a reptile - a snake, to confirm his suspicions that though she appeared to be normal, all was not as it seemed.

She takes a step back, Apophis' voice still echoing in her ears. Oz's words are all but lost to her as the demonic powers take hold - heartbeats, breathing, the heat signatures of those present all are becoming known to her and mixing in that bizarre amalgamation of noise and vision and an odd sixth sense granted to her by the serpent within.

Enough of this! it snaps. She seems to almost freeze up for a moment before her eyes dim and her demeanor immediately changes to that of nonchalant casualness. Her eyes fade, no longer luminescent but now gold.

"Sorry about that," she says, voice smooth. "Don't worry about it."

"It seems you house more power than you appear," Behemoth commented, extending a hand towards her in gesture. "Perhaps I'm not the only one blessed with powers of the reptilian kind. Though us dragons are, admittedly, in a league of our own."

"Kinda hard not to when your eyes are not the same colour as before. And, unless I missed something drastic, you didn't put colour contacts in." Sean said, his arms crossed. He sighed, waving a hand.
"Bah, whatever. I'm gonna assume it's just...you."
He turned to Behemoth.
"I mean...you might be in a league of your own, but is that supposed to mean you're extremely good at something or extremely bad?"

"You assume wrong," she drawls. "You can call me Apophis. Call it multiple personalities, call it crazy, I don't care, but I'm not her even if we do inhabit the same...space."

"Nice to meet you then, Apophis!" Oz cheerfully said, flashing her the same grin he had been giving Behemoth only moments before. He didn't trust her in the slightest. But arguing with her wasn't going to get him anywhere; it seemed like spending more time with her was the only way he could figure out what was going on. "I don't know how the whole sharing the same body thing works, but I'm Oz - in case you didn't hear!"

"I heard, and the pleasure is mine, Gandalf," she answers.

Behemoth watched the interaction idly. "Well. I must admit now that I've been introduced to you all I'm quite bored. Though I'm eager to find the reason to my sudden arrival here. Perhaps it is fate that we're all here... but that would be rather dull."

"So are you, but we're not complaining," Sean said, referring to the dullness Behemoth had spoken of. He basically ignored Apophis and Oz -- their interaction boring him.

"Your attitude suggests otherwise," Behemoth replied calmly in return.

Oz's attention shifted from Apophis to the other two. He studied them with interest, trying to discern their personalities from snippets of their conversation. Behemoth seemed almost like a comical sort of villain from the combination of his name and the way that he talked, but Oz wasn't going to take any chances by guessing that he was just putting on a show.

And Sean? He had no idea about him. He seemed relatively okay, but there was something about the way that he chatted with someone like Behemoth that rubbed Oz the wrong way.

Oz clapped his hands together to draw attention to him. "Okay! So now that we've gotten all our introductions out of the way, we should really try figuring out how we got here. We must have something in common. Any thoughts on what?"

“Clearly we’re here based on some merits of our character.” Behemoth bellowed. “Whether our character is pure or marred by evil deeds I’ll leave for you to deduce.”

"Evil deeds over here," Apophis says. "Even Auryon will admit that."