[Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Sun Dec 04, 2011 5:53 pm

The world still seemed to be slowly revolving around Syn's head, and it seemed like there was nothing he could do to stop it from spinning, so he decided he was just going to lie where he was for a bit, mud or no mud. There was a limit to how much he could do when he wasn't feeling great, and scrambling out of a pit and then finding somewhere warm and dry to recuperate was far, far above his limit. It was a bit of a shock when he suddenly found himself in the pit with someone else.

He started, lurching half out of the mud and into a clumsy sit before drooping sideways again, having to rescue himself from a very undignified fall back into the mud. It took a minute for his eyes to focus, then whoever it was was cleaning his face off of mud, making it hard to see who it was- at least it had to be a dragon, not a scumbag human. He spluttered, trying to avoid the female's rough tongue.
"I'm not a cub!" he finally managed to force out as she stepped back again, his ears flicked back against his skull (and promptly getting muddy against the rest of his fur again). They slowly flicked up again as he properly saw who else it was- a pure white dragon, the scales along her legs fading to a pretty blue, and almost as immaculately kept as he was. Well, was normally. This was turning into a bit of an off day for him.

Trying to regain some sort of composure (and succeeding with various results), he slowly sunk back down onto one side, the end of his tail twitching. Being closer to the ground seemed to make him feel less ill, and he was able to respond with a little self-control this time.
"I rather think everyone has a name, if only you try to find it," he said rhetorically. "But mine is Syntribos. And I'm perfectly fine." He wasn't going to let this female think he was some sort of pathetic drip of a dragon, despite the fact he rather looked like one.

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Sun Dec 04, 2011 6:29 pm

She rolled her eyes. "While yes you are somewhat attractive, you are covered in mud. Until such a time as you can stand on your own you won't be getting out of this hole." She yanked the rest of the net off him and moved back. "Come on up you go. The sooner we get you out of here, the sooner you can get cleaned off and on your way." She hadn't seen another running dragon in quite a long time, this was a pleasant surprise to her. "For short I think I'll call you Syn, don't want to mispronounce a name and get the end of my tail bitten off." She paused and sniffed the air. "Was there an ice dragon in the area recently? I can still smell its blood if there was."

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Sun Dec 04, 2011 8:22 pm

“Excuse me?” asked Syn, completely taken aback by Mirage’s blunt words. He couldn’t help the warmth that flooded to his cheeks. The sensation only intensified as she pulled the net off his back legs, finally freeing him from the long knotted lengths that had plagued him so the first time he had tried to escape from the pit. He went for the dignified approach as he stood, flicking his tail to one side and raising his nose into the air a little.
“Well, I didn’t know you had taken such a disliking to me already, wanting to see the back of me so fast,” he said, his tail twitching again. His eyes flicked to the end of her own tail, assessing the blue tuft that ended it- it was by no means as spectacular as his own beautifully flared pride and joy. Or at least, as spectacular as it normally was… there really was beginning to be a little bit of a pattern emerging here. He padded over to her side, looking her up and down and trying to restrain his comments on how her scales kept such a clean matt look to them.
“Hm? Oh yes, there was, nasty little whelp of a creature. Has it gone? It really was starting to get irritating.” He rolled his eyes. Finally, the creature had got the message.

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Sun Dec 04, 2011 8:40 pm

She laughed. "When a huge Mist Hound runs onto the scene and starts ripping things to shreds any sensible creature, smaller or otherwise, should stay out of the way." She paused and shook her head. "You were yelling quite a bit earlier. I just assumed you'd want out of here the first chance you got. Though if you want to stay for a while I wouldn't be 'too' displeased about it." she said flicking her tail to one side. She followed his line of sight to her tail, which now looked ragged and she turned pink with embarrassment. "Ehm. . .Ah it's still in the general area most likely in a tree somewhere." She sniffed the shut bear trap and hid a smile, so this vain desert dragon wasn't ALL mean. She turned and with one of her paws started to wipe off most of the excess mud and dirt from the stranger. She proceeded to look around the pit and turned, taking a large vertical jump and pulling herself out of the hole. "Think you can do that? If not I'll find some vines or a tree branch and pull you out."

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Sun Dec 04, 2011 9:52 pm

“Yes well…” Syn fumbled for words, still a little scrambled from the dart he had been shot with. “I’m sure I would have been just fine without your assistance. I can handle myself around stinking two-legs, I’m not helpless.” He sniffed in displeasure, then looked across at her again. She didn’t quite strike him as the average sort of dragon- here, he could actually have found another dragon that may deserve his company. And bloody hell, it seemed as though she liked his company too, the second compliment in about as many minutes!

He snapped his mouth shut as she started to clean the mud off the rest of his pelt, biting back the comments that normally would have just sprung right from his lips without a second thought. He couldn’t stop them all though- that just wasn’t his nature. “I do have the ability to clean my own fur off, you know.” He licked at one side, grimacing at the disgusting earthy taste on his tongue. “Having a tongue really is quite the advantage.”

But having someone else wash his fur was so much nicer than having to do it himself. It was almost like he had a pack back again.

Despite the fact that all the mud wasn’t off when Mirage backed away, Syn reluctantly also stopped cleaning off his fur. He very much doubted that he would be properly clean until he got back to the desert, and got a good sand bath under his fur. He tried to properly regain his composure as Mirage leapt out of the pit, looking doubtfully at the slope she had just leapt up before looking around the rest of the pit for another way up. It was a bit of a scramble, but he too managed to get himself out of the hole without getting too muddy again.

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Sun Dec 04, 2011 10:30 pm

She gave a wide grin and walked over to him. "Yes I knew you were capable of cleaning your own fur, but I wanted to help a little bit seeing as you, along with most of the rest of the world, don't like the taste of mud. Don't suppose you like bathing in water the way you clean your fur. If you can bear to disgrace yourself by bathing in a river I can point you in the right direction." She began to walk in the general direction and waved the end of her tail under his nose. "Will you be following me? Or will you be leading?" She figured she'd ask just for the sake of it. "Where "are" you going in such a hurry? Something sounded awfully urgent before you and that other dragon got stuck."

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Sun Dec 04, 2011 11:33 pm

Syn sniffed again, frustrated all his comments were being thrown back at him with equal force. This hadn’t happened before… he swiped a lick across his shoulder, flattening down a few rogue hairs before padding up to the mist hound, matching Mirage’s steps.
“I don’t do following. I don’t do followers either,” he said, sticking his nose back into the air. Of course, his arrogance didn’t mean that he knew where he was going- but he could always pretend… and following wasn’t so hard from the same spot, he just had to be observant for when the mist hound changed direction. “They irritate me. One shouldn’t use another’s paws to stand, when he has paws of his own to stand upon.”

He turned his nose up at the mention of Hydra, his tail swiping from side to side. “And that is why we were going so fast. Well, I say we… I want trying to get away from the little pest.”

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Sun Dec 04, 2011 11:58 pm

"Huh, you're pretty intolerant for a member of a species that stays in packs 90% of the time at least. My kind actually aren't all that social family wise. I'm the only one of my kind for five miles around here as far as I know." She walked to a less muddy patch of swamp where leaf litter covered the ground and soft spongy moss could be found every ten to twenty feet or so. "This is about as dry as swamps can get, my friend: moss, leaf litter, and fairly solid ground with small mud holes here and there about the size of your paw, but not damaging."

She dragged her claws down a nearby tree and about stripped it of its bark on that side. "Lots of natural fragrances from the trees and flowers, and there's little to no human pollution this far in, any humans that get this far don't last long in MY territory." Mainly due to the fact the only humans she ever saw in her territory were poachers out to capture animals and destroy the swamp.

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Mon Dec 05, 2011 12:30 am

“I wouldn’t say I was the best example of my breed,” said Syn. “Behavioural wise, at least. You won’t come across a better example in any other aspect.” A cocky smirk crossed the desert chaser’s face. Despite the fact he didn’t generally live with a pack though, he had to admit that voluntarily living by himself sounded pretty miserable. Why Mirage would choose such an existence was beside him.

He was halfway through a muse that probably would have developed further when he accidentally put his paw into one of the mud holes the mist hound had just mentioned. It got covered with black goo- again. And it stunk. He grimaced, shaking it violently from side to side like a cat. “You actually live here? I didn’t realise you were a bog-rat. Pardon my mistake.” She wasn’t even joking either- the way she seemed to know about the trees and the places to put her feet, she was definitely used to living in the swamplands.

“You seem to have rather neglected those slimy two-legs that tried to trap me,” Syn said pointedly, his ears flicking backwards at the memory.

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Mon Dec 05, 2011 12:48 am

"I can only take so much human flesh before I get ill, they have a weird taste." She looked a bit hurt at the term "bog-rat" and assumed an air much like Syn had earlier. "Excuse me, I didn't think it mattered where I lived, but you obviously think I'm beneath you now." Underneath her false arrogance she was actually hurt by that name he called her. "Humans have higher priority over things that are trapped but alive. A live human that knows what to do about a vicious dragon is a threat that must be eaten, no matter how disgusting." She wandered down to a sand bank by a shallow river, the water at it's highest only coming up to about her elbows and knees. "If you're going to bathe this is the best place, no "crocs" as humans call them to come nipping at your ankles. Unless you wish to continue to be covered in dried mud and smell like a human."

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Mon Dec 12, 2011 8:53 pm

Syn sniffed. Maybe this mist hound was less than she seemed. “That ‘weird taste’ is what makes them so delectable,” he said. That ‘weird taste’ was what he lived for; it was why he spent so much time chasing down the creatures he hated. If they weren’t so moreish, he would have thought himself mad and given up long ago. “Any two-leg deserves to be eaten, knowledgeable or not. Especially the tiny ones. Noisy and a possible irritation in the future.”

Mirage didn’t make much sense to Syntribos; granted, he wasn’t very well-versed with females, much less with trying to be civil with females too. So to her quick-jumping assumptions, he just rolled his eyes and followed her onwards. He sneered in concern for his own pelt as she came to a halt in the middle of a river that crossed the swamp in front of them though.
“You expect me to go in that?” he asked, his face a picture of incredulity. Water? She had to be having a laugh. Even with all the mud, he wasn’t going to have a bath! “I smell nothing like a human.” He put his ears back, but surreptitiously took a gentle whiff of his coat. Underneath the dirt-smell, yes, there was a bit of human scent. Eww. “Surely there is some better route to getting clean? Sand baths always did it rather nicely for myself.”

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Mon Dec 12, 2011 9:23 pm

"Sand? HERE?" She laughed. "Dear little Syn, this is the least wet part of the swamp. It'd behoove you to either live with the mud until you find where you're going, or wash it off here and dry in the sun. Your choice, but I'll be brutally honest you look like a human who just went mud wrestling wearing a dragon skin. I'd choose a bath if I were you." She licked some dirt from his cheek and spat it out on the ground. She rolled her eyes and sighed. "Stubborn little muddy hairball. It's just water!" She jumped in and soaked for a couple of minutes before climbing out and shaking off the excess water. Syn was not being easy to deal with, and eventually she thought she'd have to just push him in.

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Sun Dec 25, 2011 2:28 pm

As Mirage scorned him, Syn prickled. A human who just went mud wrestling? Stubborn little muddy hairball? Sure, he didn’t look his best, but he had just been stuck in some pit for god-knows how long. Did she expect him to look perfect?! He sat down on the edge of the water’s bank, looking haughtily down his nose at the water below his paws. Ugh, it just sent shivers down his spine just looking at the stuff. He had promised himself never to set paw in water! So condescending too, treating him like a kit.
“You may think water a trivial thing, but you live in this… cesspit. I am a desert dragon.”

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Sun Dec 25, 2011 5:09 pm

"Versatility is key. Given the choice I'd rather stay somewhere where I won't bake in ten minutes, but I can survive in a desert if I have to. Look, Syn, if you really don't want to get in the water then alright. . ." Her ears went down sadly and she looked at the ground. She walked over and proceeded to clean off more mud from his pelt. "I suppose someone else helping to clean you off is better than a bath any day." She spat out a bit of mud and her tail twitched. "Just because I'm doing this for you doesn't mean a thing."

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Wed Dec 28, 2011 9:45 pm

It seemed that, after a fair bit of Syn's complaining, Mirage might actually have finally understood that he didn't like water. Huzzah, a breakthrough. They were rare things, breakthroughs, but so sweet when they came. And then, even more fun to crush. That was what Syn liked to have fun doing, crushing the hopes and dreams of others.

But he was getting ahead of himself here. Even now she seemed to persevere to try and clean off his fur, something he should have been more adverse to than he really was. It took him a couple of seconds to react to her licking her rough tongue across his pelt, and then he still wasn't that adverse to it. Something in the back of his mind whispered you know, this is a little bit like having a pack back again. And you like it. He tried to shake the voice, and Mirage, away, but only managed to find himself knee-deep in more trouble. Namely, he had stepped back into the water.
"Dammit! Look what you made me do!" he said, looking at disgust at the slightly muddy water that swirled around his paws. Already he could feel it seeping up his legs, soaking through to his skin... ugh, this was what he had been trying to avoid! He had managed to walk right into the one thing he didn't want!

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Wed Dec 28, 2011 10:49 pm

She laughed a bit and walks behind him, giving him a nudge. "Then move to relatively dry land you numbskull." He was rather cute in the way he was acting like a kit refusing a bath. "Come along stubborn little kit outta the water now." She laughed again and got out of the water. "You're a skinny dragon to be sure, and your lovely tail now looks like a mop." She shook out her fur again and gave a catlike smile. "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, and I won't tell anyone the "Mighty Syntribos" set foot in a river. Unless you decide to mess with my tail: then I will tear you to pieces."

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Sat Jan 28, 2012 2:10 pm

Growling angrily under his breath, Syn delicately climbed out of the water and back onto the bank again. He shook the excess water out of his pelt, still dripping onto the wiry marsh grass even after. Sure, a little of the mud had gone, but he felt no better for it. When he ran his tongue over his paws they tasted like dirt.
“I have no wish greater than to get out of that disgusting liquid muck,” he said, his voice low. Oh how he hated this wretched marsh. “No doubt it has affected your mind; have you nothing to say except insults?” He gave her a side-look, twitching more water droplets off the end of his tail.

It struck him that Mirage probably was one of the strangest dragons he had met; excepting, of course, the dragons in Maledictus Eice. She was so… here one minute, gone the next. Insults were followed by sudden threats against actions he hadn’t even made against her. Then there was this strange mothering that filled all the other spaces of time. A slight scowl passed over his face, then he smoothed it away before it could be noticed.
“Which way is out of this ditchwater?” he asked, the dampness up his legs horrible against his skin.

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Sat Jan 28, 2012 5:43 pm

Her ears went back quietly and she said nothing for a time. She looked at him reluctantly and found herself hardly able to speak. "W-Well. . .It's this way. . ." she said almost sadly. Seemed he didn't like her sense of humor after all. The fact that he kept insulting her just made it worse. "I guess it's possible that I need a change of environment." she admitted slowly walking in the direction to the edge of the swamp. She was having a little trouble keeping her thoughts together and she was all over the place because of it. 'Get a hold of yourself for pity's sake you're acting pathetic! Stick to one thing for a while, something he doesn't mind.' "Would you be. . .Willing to tell me about where you live?"

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Fri Feb 17, 2012 2:12 pm

Possible? Only possible that the mist hound needed a change of environment. Syn thought this was mad- why was there even a question mark over such an idea? In all threads of thought (and a few was quite a lot, for Syn), he came to the conclusion that the marsh was a terrible place to live, and moving out was an instant must. He rolled his eyes at the grey-looking sky as Mirage started to lead off back to the desert again, finally putting him on some sort of course to get back to his homeland. Oh, he just couldn’t wait to get sand under his poor dirty paws again…

“My desert? It’s the opposite of this… place,” said Syn at the other dragon’s tentative question, keeping his voice neutral. “Bright, wide, and no damned water all over the place. Just golden sand for leagues on end.” Why, even just thinking of it made the bogs they were stuck in even grimmer than before. Such a difference between the two!

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Fri Feb 17, 2012 6:41 pm

"Sounds wonderful." she replied. "Sounds at least tolerable compared to all the ruckus that happens here." Upon a quick glance at him she twitched her ears and hopped over a small patch of mud. "Course if that's where you come from I suppose I can expect to be called a bog-rat quite a bit by the rest of your kind can't I?" She had hoped that he was just an anomaly for his breed, but something told her most of his race was probably as stuck up as he was. "Just curious but why do you live all alone? It just seems wrong that you'd ostracize yourself like that." It was only after she asked that question that she thought of the numerous answers she could end up with, and how obvious some of them were. She was making an idiot of herself today, how embarrassing!

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Tue Feb 21, 2012 9:21 pm

Syn was faintly pleased about the fact that Mirage had taken such a liking to the thought of living in a desert- the mist hound actually had a small iota of sense in her brain. Of course, she did live in the swamp at the moment, which detracted slightly, but still, this was better than nothing.
Since when did he want company?!
Something very strange was going on with him today, to actually want company for a short time. Maybe he was going soft inside? “Well, I can’t say for the rest of my kind. A fair few aren’t known for their cleverness; they can be downright thick, and that’s putting it lightly,” said Syn, not afraid to slag off his own kind. After all, they had done him no favours, back when he was in a pack.

His ears flicked back against his skull at her next question again. “I dislike the company of lesser beings,” he said. “They bore me. How much further?”

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Tue Feb 21, 2012 9:30 pm

"If you looked past your own nose you'd see we've got just a few hundred yards." she remarked pointedly, taking off in a trot but stopping to look back. "You're supposed to be fast, Syn. Live up to expectations once in a while!" His answers didn't surprised her all that much given his general personality. The ground started to feel firmer under her paws as she kept moving and it was actually a welcome alternative to the muck and mud of the bog. "I can already see why you don't like bogs compared to your desert." Of course now she was starting to realize that going back to living in a swamp wasn't going to happen; she'd never be happy there again.

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Tue Feb 21, 2012 10:56 pm

It was slightly embarrassing for Syn not have not noticed, through all his whinging, that they were so close to the desert's edge. He shook it off though, huffing quietly through his nose and following her into the desert- well, edge of desert- at a speedier pace. Ah, finally, hard ground under his paws again, not ground that went squeltch and was icky.
"Hate to blow my own trumpet," hah, what a lie! "but I told you so. The desert is so much better than that swamp." A shiver ran down his pelt, the end of his tail twitching from side to side at the end. "You see the light now?"

==X==

A couple of days later, and although Syn would never have guessed it in a million years, he and Mirage were still travelling together. They had headed away from the swamplands fast, moving into the deeper desert, where sand lay in thick banks in every direction they could see. The desert chaser loved his desert, running, the heat, just being in its warm glowing sands. He was enjoying having someone to run with; he had been alone for a long time, and for a pack dragon, that was hard. How long it would last, this allegiance, he didn't know, but didn't question to find out. Maybe he was afraid of finding out? Maybe he just didn't care. Either and both was possible.
They crested a thin ridge of sand, stirring up the yellow particles around their feet as they came to a halt. Below, in front of them, lay a little camp of tents, the settlement of two-legs who thought they could survive in the desert. Syn sneered at the sight. As if they could tame the desert.

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Tue Feb 21, 2012 11:31 pm

With a bit of a snort/laugh she nodded. "Yes I've seen the proverbial light, thank you."

---xXx---

"Humans would fry in this heat. I've actually seen them blister come to think of it from being outside too long. Bet that tiny little hovel won't last the rest of the month." she stated with a bit of a smirk. "Not with you around constantly eating the humans." She'd learned to tolerate the taste a bit better, seeing as there wasn't much in the desert to eat. Though at that moment she was still watching the little encampment in cat-like interest. "So, what to do? Eat or. . .just decimate them?" He usually knew what he was doing and she had learned to agree with him most of the time.

Subject: Re: [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child Wed Feb 22, 2012 10:19 pm

"Blistered humans? Hmm, I can't say that would be a terrible thing," commented Syn, eyes raking over the small cluster of tents in front of them. It looked small enough for them to raid... and they hadn't had much fun today yet. It was time to kick the ant's nest. "It might be a little like cooking them. Not much chance for that with me, unless they set themselves on fire." That had happened once. It had been a riot watching the filthy two-leg writhe, and a joy afterwards to munch through his crisp flesh. It was something to try next time there was definitive fire around; drive the two-legs towards the flames, then make them choose between a hot death by burning or a cold death by claws.
"I'm in the mood for some terrorizing. We'll take them from one direction, then scatter them a bit around the desert. If they're clever and stick together, we can fight, or bugger off, if they split... their loss." Loss of lives too; humans were easy to take down on their own.

Tightening his claws once around the sand underneath his paws, he started down the sandbank in front of them at a slow lope, not wanting to waste his energy he might need in a minute. The camp was quite quiet overall, most of the inhabitants taking an afternoon siesta, but there were one or two sitting outside or wandering around.

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