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| Hunting High and Low; Fox! | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Jun 30 2012, 11:34 AM (409 Views) | |
| Nherva | Jun 30 2012, 11:34 AM Post #1 |
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Lurker Queen
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Ahnu chuckled softly to herself where she sat on a large boulder overlooking the clear field where the bonasus herd they'd spotted had already started stampeding. She knew she should probably be feeling bad about it, but she couldn't bring herself to when watching her Water flounder about in the air after the herd, being no better there than on the ground. In her defense, Fathom had been the one claiming to want red meat for his lunch. Normally they'd fly to the ocean east of the Academy and Lihn for him to do his hunting, since he excelled at doing so in the water being that it was his element. Fathom's problem was his wings. While functional and allowing flight, his length and their odd shape made maneuvering quickly difficult for him, and in order to keep up with the herd, he had to turn frequently and then get back up to speed. He wasn't a very fast dragon in the air either. "Eeeehhh," the silvery Water lamented as he flopped on the ground near his rider's perch and collapsed, panting. "Stupid beasts. I'm wiped," he breathed, resting his chin on the rock where Ahnu was sitting, his body coiling on the grass behind him, his sides heaving. "I'm sure you'll get lucky eventually dear," Ahnu said, her tone more amused than reassuring as she patted his scale-marbled nose. "I told you to bring help. It always works better when you bring help." Fathom sighed again, his fan-like ridge drooping, "I suppose I should have..." Though he wasn't sure who he'd have brought with him. He hadn't seen Scylla in a few weeks and most of his classmates that he knew were busy doing their own thing. Too busy for a hunting trip at least. Then again, now that he thought about it, he knew an awful lot of dragons, but none of them were particularly close friends. Even if Fathom could walk into a room and be friends with everyone, it was a rare occurrence that he'd get to really get to know anyone. Things just moved so quickly sometimes. That might have been all fine and good for his rider, but he generally wished to be more social than the occasional party. He'd have to remedy that...maybe then he'd have a hunting partner when he got a craving for a land beast. "What I'd give to be shorter, or have longer legs...or something," he chuckled softly. "You're fine just the way you are," Ahnu said flatly. She liked Fathom as he was and wouldn't trade his ungainly self for any more graceful dragon ever. "You're just not made for the air," she added with a small shrug. "Though I'll admit its hilarious to watch." "You laugh at my pain!" Fathom whined, feigning offense. "Well, you wanting to try again or shall we head to the mangroves?" When all else failed, the mangroves off Nyushi were ripe hunting grounds even if the prey there was fairly small in comparison to the open ocean. "After I rest, I will try again," the Water answered, glancing back at the herd, still milling wildly at his former intrusion into their peaceful feeding ritual. "What are you doing there?" He asked curiously, noticing Ahnu fiddling with something in her hands. "Not sure yet, necklace or bracelet maybe," she shrugged as she braided together the colorful threads she'd brought with her. "Course for you I should probably be making a net," she smirked. "Now there's an idea," Fathom blinked. Not there was anything remotely usable as a net lying around nearby. |
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| Foxikoosh | Jun 30 2012, 12:30 PM Post #2 |
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BOTANY
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"Heeeeey, what are you eating?" Pelli asked her rider curiously, nearly doing a sideways roll when she turned her head to look at him. Used to his small dragon's inability to maintain a straight course when she was twisting to look at him, Denahi said nothing, his only reaction being to lean slightly to the left as Pelli dipped to the right. With his leg crossed non-chalantly over the saddle, hooked around a saddle-horn he'd made specifically for the purpose, he cut another slice of the apple he was eating and looked up to meet his dragon's silver eyes. "...An apple?" he replied, crunching down on the slice he'd just cut off. Pelli blinked at him, and started making the world's most obnoxious high pitched whistle-whine. "Why? I thought you were about to go hunting," he said conversationally over the sound. She was about to make the puppy-dog face at him, he just knew it. He took another bite of the apple. "Yes, because I'm hungry. And you're eating an apple!" she responded with an indignant squeal of silver horns. Denahi laughed, the ghost of a smile flickering across his face at having once again provoked a response from Pelli. "Yeah, yeah, alright, just stop whining, it's obnoxious," he grumbled, putting his knife away and uncrossing his leg from the saddle. He leaned forward to toss the better part of the apple to Pelli, but his aim was off, and it dropped short of her nose. She curled around after it and really did flip over midair, startling a grunt from her rider as he grabbed somewhat frantically for the saddle. He was used to this silliness, but it didn't prevent his stomach dropping to his toes every time his bonded decided to get acrobatic. "Dammit, Pelli, wouldn't warn a guy?" he growled at her as she came out of the roll after the apple and proceeded to hover for a split second, sharp eyes watching the fall of the apple towards the forest below. Denahi felt it the split-second before she dove, which he assumed was her version of "warning" him, and so wasn't caught completely off guard as his dragon dropped, her wings slicking back to her sides as she went after the apple, a sunset-hued comet falling from the sky. She snatched the apple from midair with a snap of narrow jaws and threw her wings out to stop herself about ten feet from the ground. The sudden stop slammed her rider into her neck, but he was used to that, and just pushed himself back up. "Thanks for the warning, by the way," he snarked, and she just grinned, looping out to the side and then hovering a few feet off the ground. Denahi, taking his cue, threw his leg over the front of her saddle and slid off with practiced ease. Pelli nodded and shot forward, low over the field, not really paying attention to anything except the bonasus herd she saw up ahead. When she saw them, she sent them running with a happy, somewhat feral shriek. They were fast, and they were agile, but so was she. When one broke from the herd and tried to flee back the way it'd come, she dropped a wing, flipped over, and dropped on it. It wasn't terribly graceful, because she was moving too quickly to just land on the thing. Instead, she slammed into it and with a surprised bugle, kept going and rolled head over tail, wings flailing wildly as the bonasus twisted to get away from her. Flinging herself back upright with a shove of her wings against the ground, she grabbed it by the neck and shook. It went still, and she stood over it for a second panting and flicking her wings to get them back into place. She was going to feel that little disaster tomorrow... "Hey, that was-" Pelli looked up when her rider suddenly stopped talking to see all the usual walls going up, his face assuming a look of neutrality, and turned to look behind her. Oh. People. Pelli straightened, finished resettling her wings, and attempted to look noble or regal or at least not like she'd just been rolling around on the ground trying to kill her lunch. "I'm sorry! I didn't see you! Did I just chase off your lunch?" she asked of the Water dragon, looking a little uncertainly at the bonasus she'd just killed. "I can share, if I did. I wasn't paying attention..." she remarked. |
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| Nherva | Jun 30 2012, 07:57 PM Post #3 |
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Lurker Queen
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Ahnu looked up only a fraction of a second before the shriek from the new arrival in the area rang out over the field. Fathom jerked and whipped his head around to see what the commotion was, tensing in concern. Just in case. The war was over, but that didn't mean an end to the hostilities between Sekkaians and many of the Tainted. As he'd learned the hard way, some desperate Taint stragglers wandered pretty close to Lihn and the Academy, but as he looked up to see the other dragon, he determined there was no way that it could have been a Taint. Not with colors like that! "Now that's what I need to learn to do," he laughed as he watched her fly low over the scrambling herd to single out her target. And then she grappled with the beast, going head over heels with it rather than killing it instantly with a quick neck snap or other killing blow. The Water blinked worriedly and moved to stand in case it was hurt. "Yeah, that was certainly graceful," Ahnu commented dryly, barely lifting her eyes from whatever she was working on, though she had watched the whole thing. He wondered briefly why she seemed to be ignoring the newcomer suddenly, and then he noticed the other rider and gave a heavy sigh. Ahnu's habit of allowing herself to be spoken to rather than speaking was a taxing quality for the young and friendly dragon. "Oh no," Fathom said as he was noticed and the small Sonic apologized. "Not really," he gave a nervous chuckle. "I had been trying to catch one earlier, but uh--," "He's a klutz," Ahnu spoke up. While she could sometimes appreciate Fathom's euphemisms to protect himself and others from negative evaluations, sometimes pussyfooting around just wasn't worth it. He was a horrible hunter on land and an equally unskilled flier. He probably always would be with the odd way his wings seemed to be wings and giant fins all at once. At least he'd excel in marine combat should he ever need to. "Yes, that's one way of putting it," he agreed. "Normally I got to the ocean or the mangroves to hunt, but," he shrugged, "Sometimes I just get a craving. I'll try again once I get some more rest I suppose from my first attempt. I am Fathom, by the way. And if you don't mind my saying, your scales remind me of an ocean sunset. Beautiful." "Great, just make her think you're hitting on her," Ahnu rolled her eyes. Fathom wouldn't know how to flirt properly if it bit him in the butt. He was just far too simple to care for complicated social affairs...like flirting. If he thought something was pretty, he said it. It was probably a quality that would make a flight hard for him to win, but he didn't seem to be any hurry to father offspring anyway. "Nevermind Ahnu, she's just jealous," he said with a light chuckle, "Enjoy your lunch. Perhaps I can provide some entertainment while you eat when I try again." |
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| Foxikoosh | Jul 2 2012, 05:59 PM Post #4 |
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BOTANY
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Kokopelli stood there flicking her tail a little self-consciously as Denahi joined her, looking over at her bonded to see if he'd say anything this time without being prompted. Sometimes he did, and sometimes he pulled the sullen and taciturn act and wouldn't say a word before someone else spoke to him- and even then sometimes it was one word answers. He could be amazingly unsociable when he put his mind to it, although she'd long since figured out it wasn't always on purpose. He was just... really bad at dealing with people. Unless he was arguing. Denahi was very talented at arguing. She couldn't tell what sort of mood he was in today, though, and he'd been pleasant enough earlier. He was, however, watching the other rider with a sort of detached wariness, his jaw clamped shut. Kokopelli sighed softly and turned her attention to the other pair, head tilted curiously at the Water. She cut off an amused snort at his rider's contribution to his answer, flicking a quick look at her own rider- it was exactly the sort of thing he'd say. "Oh, well, I can't swim, so we're probably even," she replied, and then grinned at his compliment. She wouldn't have known flirting if it'd walked up and bitten her, and she was so flighty that her reaction to flirting would usually have been to get flustered and make an idiot of herself. But she did like compliments, even though she wasn't terribly vain. Denahi sidestepped to avoid a flick of her wings as she ducked her head for a moment. "Thanks!" she answered as Denahi moved back over and nonchalantly shoved her shoulder for making him dodge another of her many wing-and-tail twitches. His dragon reminded him forcefully of some birds, the way she seemed incapable of being still. She even twitched in her sleep. "Don't let it go to your head," he muttered at her- she knew it was good-naturedly, but she wasn't always sure others understood his words quite the way she did. Maybe he hadn't noticed, but people gave him the strangest looks sometimes. Pelli often wanted to stop them and reassure them that her rider was only putting on an act, only kidding, but... she also knew then he'd be embarassed, and like most other things, she reasoned it was something he'd take his own sweet time getting over. Once upon a time, he /had/ actually meant it. So at least he didn't mean it anymore. "Maybe they'll be so tired from running around you won't have any trouble?" she offered reassuringly. If they'd been chased by not one, but two dragons this morning, there had to be at least one that was suffering from the excess of exercise. "And if you don't catch anything, you can still have some of mine! It's too big for me to eat all at once, and I'm sure Denahi won't mind not taking the extra back to the kitchens, right?" she asked, turning at the last to her rider and trying to include him in the conversation. He gave her the "surprised prey animal" look and then blinked, realizing exactly what she was up to. With a frown, he cleared his throat. "Um... no, I don't mind. I'd just make jerky, anyway," he said, and then went silent. |
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| Nherva | Jul 5 2012, 11:17 AM Post #5 |
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Lurker Queen
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"Perhaps I will have better luck with another try," Fathom said, rising from the grass, his silvery coils stretching tiredly. He spread his fan-like wings, "Well, enjoy your dinner and a show, this should be even more entertaining than last time," he laughed, unabashed by the fact that he was probably going to make a complete fool of himself again, only this time with someone else watching. His body coiled like a spring and he gave a powerful leap, using the corded muscle of his elongated form more than his short legs to get himself aloft. The herd had stopped stampeding after Kokopelli's kill, but with Fathom taking off again, they started to prance nervously. The Water hoped that at least one of them would be too tired to keep up this time. Ahnu blinked as the Sonic's rider said something. If not for the fact that she spoke to him, he might as well have not been there at all for how silent he was. Ahnu, herself, wasn't sure if he'd be worth talking to in the first place, at least, not until his dragon's comment to him and his answer. Well, at least he wasn't like some of the other riders she'd met. Wasteful, the lot of them. But that point, however small, that the Sonic's rider would actually use her leavings from a meal in some way, made Ahnu less likely to ignore him completely. "Is it any good?" She asked, "The jerky you make, I mean." It wasn't much of an icebreaker, but Ahnu didn't give too much of a damn for formalities, since it was all usually a big show anyway. Meanwhile, whilst his rider was trying to make even a little conversation, Fathom chased the herd. At least this time he'd been able to pick out one of them that looked to be getting tired. He lunged at it from the sky and the bleating creature broke off from the rest of its herd to take cover in a large copse of trees that eventually joined the rest of the jungle that made up most of Nyushi. "Bah, you stupid beast," Fathom gave a sharp, surprised roar that the creature would think of such a thing to thwart him and hovered in a circle over the trees to think. If he could get to it, it'd be his best chance at a meal. Even if Kokopelli offered to share hers, he knew his appetite would demand more than half a beast, especially since it had been several days since his last one. But then a thought occurred to him, when he reminded himself of the Sonic. Keeping an eye on the tree line, he flew back to the small group and called out to her. "Kokopelli, would you mind giving me a hand? He ran into the trees, perhaps you could...chase him out of there? Scare him out with some noise or something?" He asked, the circumstances of her previous mating flight and trees months ago completely unbeknownst to him. He would get his dinner one way or another, but a little help from the Sonic wouldn't hurt. Besides, Ahnu would be fine on her own, even if she and Kokopelli's rider just ended up staring awkwardly at each other. The Water rider looked up at her dragon's sinuous form trying to hover over them and she shook her head. Perhaps part of the reason Fathom was so physically strong was because of those little things he did trying to act like a dragon a quarter of his size. It would probably come in handy someday, but it didn't change the fact that he looked quite ridiculous trying to do such things. "Sometimes I wish I was a better hunter," she sighed, speaking to neither dragon or rider in particular, "I'd do this for him so he didn't have to tire himself out." Certainly, once he finally caught his dinner and they returned home, the Water would collapse into his pool and sleep well into the next day while he digested his meal. "But I am terrible with a bow." Which was true. She'd not been allowed to hunt with her father and brothers growing up, and Weyrling training only covered the basics in survival. They didn't hone the skills one needed to really be an exceptional hunter. She was much better at the more benign gathering of food that didn't run, and fishing...though her patience for fishing only went so far. |
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| Foxikoosh | Jul 6 2012, 08:42 PM Post #6 |
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BOTANY
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When the Water left, Kokopelli turned to watch for several moments before her stomach growled and, with an abashed grin, she set to her meal. It wasn't graceful, it wasn't what anyone would call polite, but no dragon she'd ever met could eat without making a mess. Well, scratch that. Some of the Rosemaries with their delicate little paw-hands could manage utensils and ate without making a huge mess. But Kokopelli had never been able to do that. She left the haunches and shoulders alone, those being what her rider preferred for making jerky. While she ate, her rider was forced to make conversation. Feeling Pelli's eyes on him as she was practically inhaling her food in what appeared to be the messiest manner possible, Denahi shifted from foot to foot and didn't realize that Ahnu was actually speaking to him until Pelli stopped crunching on a bone and exhaled softly at him to prompt him. "Oh, uh..." he said, and Pelli gave the barest shake of her muzzle before going back to the leg bone she'd been cracking, "It's edible, anyway. Pelli likes it, but Pelli's taste is all in her mouth, and sometimes..." he said, taking a good-natured jab at his dragon. She snorted at him, and then turned to look at Fathom as he returned. "I wouldn't want to live on the stuff, but it's good in an emergency." He shrugged. Behind him, Pelli left her meal and turned to look at the Water, flipping her tail in interest. She wasn't so sure that she got along with trees. Her head tilted side to side as she watched the bigger dragon hover. "How're you doing that?" she asked, as in her limited experience, the bigger dragons didn't have an easy time hovering. Then she shook her head as if to set aside her own question, and looked past Fathom to the forest where his quarry had taken shelter. "Ummmm. Yes! I can help. But..." she said, eyeing the trees distrustfully, as if they might reach out and try to grab her again. Denahi took the explanation out of her hands, though. "She got stuck in some trees once, and had to be rescued," he supplied helpfully over his shoulder, though at least he tactfully did not mention it'd been during her Flight. That had been nice of him. Pelli, though, gave an embarassed shuffle of her wings and trilled lightly to cover the embarassment. "Yes, well, we can't all be perfect, can we?" she asked a little shortly, and Denahi realized he'd annoyed her, and arched both eyebrows before turning back to Ahnu as his dragon took to the air with a bit of a put-out huff. "I'll chase him out into the open then? Sounds like fun!" she bugled, spiraling out just past Fathom and then turning to wait for some sort of guidance as to where her sound and fury might be best aimed to flush the prey. "Pelli is much better at hunting than I," he admitted, because she was- when she could sit still long enough to stalk anything, and she usually got so excited when she was hunting that she couldn't hold still. "But I can use a bow and arrow. And a spear," he said. And once, an icicle. That had been wild. He'd been lucky the hare had been either stupid or already injured. He jsut barely shook his head at the memory, stuffing it back with the rest of the things from that particular part of his life. Nope. "Bows... bows are not my favorite. Too many pieces," he said, thinking his response was probably lacking in something, but unsure of what that might be. |
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| Nherva | Jul 9 2012, 02:07 PM Post #7 |
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Lurker Queen
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((apologies for the wait fox!)) Fathom circled overhead, not so much hovering still as he was just trying to stay aloft over them. "Oh...this?" he wondered at Kokopelli's question. "Well, I can't really stop or I'll probably fall out of the sky," he laughed, "But it works I suppose." He knew he was far from graceful on the ground and in the air, but he did his best. His eyes lit up when the Sonic agreed to help him. All he needed her to do was fly low enough over the trees to frighten the beast back into the open where he could dispatch it himself. She zipped past him and he turned, sinuous body undulating through the air toward her. "Well, you shouldn't have to worry about getting stuck in any trees this time," he chuckled. "I just need you to fly low enough over the tops and scare it out. I can drop onto it from above when it runs out!" He told her, flying toward the trees and beckoning her to follow. Fathom didn't give much thought to the Sonic getting stuck in the trees. In all honesty it wasn't exactly something he could hold against her when he got his long body tangled up in so many things on a regular basis. He'd never forget that time as a wyrmling when he'd been chasing Ahnu when she was teasing him with a fish and he got himself all tied up in a couple of chairs. That had been rather undignified. "This should be good," Ahnu said as the dragons flew off to do...whatever it was they planned to do in order for her Water to catch his food. She really needed to think of something to help him with his land hunting. He wouldn't be much good fighting in the air either if the war started back up and they were called into that particular service. He'd be fantastic if the Taint decided to come at them with boats, but she'd never heard of them trying a naval assault before. Chances were pretty good they'd still try to come over land in order to attack Sekkai. "Well, you've got a leg up on us then. Fathom's best hunting is...unsurprisingly done in the water," she shrugged. "Though for once I'm glad he decided he wanted one of these. Usually he'll eat his fish raw, but sometimes he'll catch a really big one and wants it cleaned and cooked. I don't get the fish smell out of my clothes for days," she shuddered. At least when he went hunting for bonasus and other wild land game he usually ate that raw too. Even if he didn't, none of it smelled as awful as fish for half as long if she was involved in the cooking process, which she preferred to be because she trusted few other individuals to do things properly for her dragon. "And I have to agree with you on that though. I think if I wanted to be proficient with any kind of weapon I'd be best with a spear or something of that nature. Though that makes range a slight problem. Not sure about my throwing arm." "Look look! There it is! I'll wait at the treeline," Fathom said to Kokopelli as they approached the forest edge where the bonasus had run. The creature was still baying and making a rather large ruckus beneath the canopy, which was what tipped him off when he searched for it. The silvery Water broke away from the sunset colored Sonic and positioned himself at the edge of the trees to wait . If he angled himself just right, he could make his shadow fall on the treetops instead of the ground and the beast wouldn't even notice the trap it was running into. |
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| Foxikoosh | Jul 17 2012, 09:06 PM Post #8 |
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BOTANY
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((No worries, I'm at least as bad!)) Kokopelli did a little turn on the tip of her wing as Fathom caught up with her, nodding her slim nose and zipping after him to the forest. She was glad he didn't need her to actually go into the trees, actually, although she didn't let on that she was relieved. When they were over the forest, she tipped her head first one way, then the other, pausing to hover lightly over the trees. As if sensing a predator, the bonasus that had been thrashing around loudly in the undergrowth had gone annoyingly quiet. Her ears, attuned as they were to her own element, zeroed in quickly on the muted shufflings of a medium-sized beast in the underbrush. Maneuvering herself so that she was behind where the bonasus snuffled in the trees, she glanced up to look at Fathom and flashed a toothy grin. Then she dropped her jaw and uttered a noise like a cross between a bark and a roar and a loud chirp. There was a crash and a bleat of astonishment and the bonasus crashed away from her, straight out of the forest and to Fathom's waiting jaws, blind with terror and not paying even the slightest bit of attention to where it was going, only where it'd been. And Pelli was still behind it. She whistled at it for good measure, but stayed well out of the way of the Water dragon, not wishing to get in his way and mess everything up. Denahi, still standing awkwardly with Ahnu as they watched the dragons, tried to figure out how he was supposed to respond to the other rider's smalltalk. He was notoriously bad at it, and snuck a sly glance back at Pelli as if she might come to his rescue and do the talking for him. But she was still over the forest, watching as she herded the beast to Fathom. Denahi decided he'd better just give it a try. At worst, he'd say something stupid and get something thrown at him for his trouble... right? "I don't think Pelli has really ever eaten fish. She's tried it once or twice when they cook it at the Academy, but she just wrinkles her nose and goes after the chicken, or the beef. She'd much rather eat any red meat, I think. Which is good, because I'm a lousy fisherman, and I'm sure she'd only end up half-drowned and whining," he said, rubbing a little self-consciously at the back of his neck. For something to do, he took out a knife and started dealing with what Pelli had left, skinning the beast's fore-half because she'd already started eating the back half. Then he realized that this was probably rude- not to mention a little gruesome, even for folks who regularly watched their dragons hunt and eat live prey. It wasn't like you usually saw people chatting away while they butchered things... so probably it wasn't something people usually did, and if he'd thought about it for ten seconds, yes, it probably would have occurred to him. So he sat back on his heels instead. "You know, sometimes it's less how far you can throw it and more about aim, if you can get close to whatever you're hunting. I get Pelli to distract them sometimes, if she can do it without terrifying them into running. Or I get her to scare them to me, kind of like she's doing with Fathom. It's easier than watching her try to catch them herself..." he said, gesturing vaguely from where he sat on the ground back at his partner, even as a roll of harsh sound broke across the intervening space and over the two riders. He winced ever so slightly. "She, uh... she is rather loud... sometimes," he added by way of apology and explanation. |
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| Nherva | Jul 29 2012, 11:11 AM Post #9 |
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Lurker Queen
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((finaleeeeee a post ))Fathom narrowed his teal hued eyes as Kokopelli swung in low over the treetops. Surely this would work. The bonasus that had eluded him was no doubt tired and it had already been breathing hard before it made it into the treeline. It was one of the slower ones, perhaps with some sort of ailment that made it less healthy than the others in the herd. If Kokopelli managed to get the beast out of the trees, he'd definitely owe her one. He'd have to find out what she might like in return for her help. He wondered briefly if she liked fish, for that was a dinner he'd have no trouble scrounging up for her if she liked it. He usually preferred fish, but every now and then his cravings changed. Fathom had seen several other Sonics in his class and Wing, but they all seemed to like something different. It was difficuly to pin down what exactly she might like when he knew of so many Sonics with so many different appetites from red meat to bread and even fruit and other greenstuffs. He didn't have much time to think about it before the female Sonic's loud barking roar startled his quarry from the trees. "Ha! Gotcha!" Fathom shouted as the creature emerged. He folded his fin-like wings and dropped, all his weight and coily bulk onto the monstrous herbivore. It screamed a final time before Fathom's massive jaws closed on the back of its neck, his dagger-like teeth slicing easily and cleanly through the spine. He lifted his head and looked up at Kokopelli as she glided over, "Thank you! You've saved the day!" Happily, the Water easily lifted the carcass and carried it back to where he could eat within earshot of his rider. Things were probably going terribly at the moment, him having left her all alone with another strange human. Ahnu only looked up when she heard the gentle rasp of a metal blade as Denahi started in on Kokopelli's kill. Better than letting it sit there and fester, she could appreciate the man's refusal to waste any time with the matter. She half expected him to apologize before he sat back and seemed to decide not to finish the job in front of her. Most would assume her of a weak constitution, if anything becuase she was female, but in her village where she'd grown up, the men did the hunting and it was the women that cleaned and skinned the animals before cooking them and making good use of the hides leftover. She didn't have to like being up to her elbows in animal blood, but it didn't bother her in the least. "Oh don't mind me," she said, continuing her own task of weaving threads together into her project she'd brought with her. "Well she is a Sonic I suppose," Ahnu grinned at the mention that Kokopelli had a tendency to be loud when she hunted. "There was a Sonic in Fathom's wyrmling class that made all kinds of racket when hunting. It was annoying but I suppose effective," she shrugged. "One of these days I'll learn something useful to help Fathom when he decides he wants to hunt on land. Until then he'll just have to bring help," she sighed. Sometimes she really hated feeling useless to her partner, but even before he'd chosen her she was always more in the ways of wishful thinking than actual usefulness. She'd always wanted to hunt, learn to survive and fight and live off the land like her father and brothers, but she'd always been shouldered aside and scolded until she was old enough to be beaten for showing interest in such masculine pursuits. She loved sewing her clothes and coming up with new designs, but it was utterly useless when it came to more practical endeavors. Ahnu frowned as those thoughts once again pushed their way into her mind. She tried not to think about it, but it still bothered her. Sure, her wyrmling training had taught her plenty about how to defend herself and care for Fathom, but compared to some of the other riders--probably Denahi included--she was a novice that shouldn't even have a dragon at her side. Heavens knew she wasn't even smart enough to pass as a scholar. Fathom's wingbeats reached her ears and she looked up briefly just before the carcass of his kill impacted the ground nearby. He landed roughly, as usual. "Make sure you eat all of that," Ahnu said flatly, out of habit, even though Fathom knew what she expected of him. "Don't worry. I'm starving," he told her, then looked at Kokopelli. "I'll share whatever bits you like the most, as a thanks for the help. If you are still hungry when finished with yours." Then he took a huge bite of the dead beast at his feet. He swallowed the great hunk of flesh, then looked at Ahnu and Denahi, "So," his tail flicked behind him, a shimmering cascade of color shining on the scales as he took sudden interest in the pair, "What are we talking about?" Nothing wrong with a little conversation to go with his dinner. |
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| Foxikoosh | Aug 8 2012, 10:56 AM Post #10 |
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BOTANY
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As she darted over Fathom with his kill, Kokopelli flicked her finned tail and trilled a little blast of fluted notes at his remark that she'd saved the day. "You're welcome!" she resplied as Fathom launched back into the air with his food, lilting along beside the bigger dragon in sparrow-like flight. She landed before they reached their riders, knowing that Denahi preferred she didn't land nearly on top of him. The gusts from her wings tended to blow his hair into his face, which was irritating when he was trying to concentrate on something. Not to mention the dust. At Ahnu's insistence that he not mind her, Denahi went back to cleaning his dragon's kill, cutting meat into chunks that he set aside to be salted and seasoned and dried later. He tipped his head thoughtfully a couple of times as he worked, mulling over the other rider's desire to do something to help her dragon. "Maybe you can learn how to herd them to him. I'm sure they're every bit as afraid of us as they are of the dragons. And if they aren't, I imagine shouting would help. The fast ones are almost impossible to catch, but every herd has weak beasts," he said, cutting another strip into chunks as he spoke. It was easier to talk to other people when he had some sort of work to do, a way to distract his fidgeting hands and nervous mind. He tapped the tip of his knife on the now-bare leg bone of the animal Pelli had brought down, using the very point of it to point at a small line. "Those are the ones that usually aren't as fast, or that run the wrong way. I guess this one had a broken leg- half-healed, but enough to slow it down for Pelli. I can't tell how she targets the ones that're sick or injured half the time, but she says you can tell by looking." He finished butchering the shoulder and partial side he'd been working on and wiped the knife on the grass, cleaning it of blood well enough that it wouldn't be harmed until he could clean it properly. "What're you working on, there?" he asked, finally, gesturing with the knife at the weaving Ahnu held in her lap. Then he realized he was gesturing at another human being with a knife and gave the weapon a bland look. He could practically hear his mother's voice- and Pelli's- 'Don't point at people with knives! Were you raised by wolves?'. The last would have been Pelli. She still, after all these years, hadn't quite contrived to weasel out of him just what had raised him for part of his young life, but her attempts to do so so often ended only in a shouting match and hurt feelings that she'd mostly stopped trying. It made him almost as uneasy as if she'd kept up the pestering As if recalled by his thoughts, he heard the flapping of two pairs of wings and turned just in time to be accosted by his dragon, who greeted him with a bump of her head that was so exuberant it would have knocked him over if he hadn't grabbed the horns on the crown of her head. "Pelli, knock it off," he said as she tossed her head, yanking him to his feet and throwing him further off balance. "Are you sure your father wasn't a puppy or something? I mean, I know you don't get this from your mother..." he harped, and she regarded him with her head tipped to the side. "So rude! And in front of strangers," she said, and made a tutting noise as she nosed him aside to get to the deer she'd left earlier. He grumbled and made room, then looked at Fathom. "We were talking about hunting. And dragons," he said, looking at Pelli and arching an eyebrow as she shot him a look that plainly implied surprise that they'd been talking about anything at all. "Mind your own business, Pelli," he growled, not even stopping to think if their standard bickering and his usual crankiness would make either of the other two uncomfortable. |
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| Nherva | Aug 14 2012, 06:04 PM Post #11 |
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Lurker Queen
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Ahnu blinked at Denahi's question of what she was working on. She hadn't expected to be asked. Few people ever paid enough attention to notice that she was ever doing more than fiddling with something to keep her hands busy. "Well," she inspected her work quickly, "It was going to be a necklace or a bracelet or something, but at this point I'm considering net-making," a smirk pulled at the corner of her mouth at the recollection of her and Fathom's earlier conversation. Fathom lifted his head from his kill, licked his chops and added, "Ahnu makes clothes to sell in Lihn. She's really very good at it. Perhaps you should show him sometime Ahnu." She rolled her eyes, "Pretty sure he wouldn't be interested in festival gowns Fathom." When she didn't make her own outfits for normal things, her biggest selling trade were gowns for the parties and balls that the nobility often took part in. She'd sold more than one or two gowns in Lihn on market weekends while they were still wyrmlings, just after Fathom got his coiling bulk into the air long enough to make the trip. "You never know. Besides," he said lowered his head to take a strip of meat from the carcass at his feet, which he swallowed with a rather sickening slurping sound. "You're good at it." Of course, it was beyond Fathom's understanding that part of the reason her gowns sold so high at market were the rare materials she sometimes got her hands on to add to the ensamble. "Or maybe Kokopelli would like to see them." It amazed him that some dragonesses rather enjoyed looking at pretty human things, though in his experience it was mostly jewelry they liked. Ahnu opened her mouth to speak, but Fathom cut her off, "Strangers! We are not strangers," he laughed, "Not since we introduced ourselves anyway." "Formalities Fathom, formalities," Ahnu gave a somewhat exasperated sigh. Her dragon had a tendency to be so simple and unobservant of some social customs that it was almost constantly irritating. He seemed to have no holds barred and no walls when it came to being friendly and doing whatever he had to do to get something done. If he had any boundaries, they were pretty far stretched. The Water cocked his head as he chewed on a legbone from his meal. "Well...then let's get the formalities out of the way," he stated, cracking the bone on his molars and swallowing the ground up bits carefully so they didn't get stuck in his throat, "What do you do? Are you in a wing?" He asked, looking pointedly at Kokopelli and Denahi. "Did you see much of the war?" "I...am so sorry," Ahnu covered her face with the palm of her hand in slight embarassment. She hadn't wanted her dragon to bombard them with questions, but he seemed to think that would very easily solve the problem of them being 'strangers'. |
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7:40 AM Jul 11