{Liz & Kat} Non-muddy forest explorations! {Hydra & Measle}

She ran to a point then her adrenaline wore thin and she stopped with a wince. "Measle, you have permission to stop me if I ever do that again!" She lay down to get off her leg and catch her breath. "Whatever means necessary." She sat up after a minute or two and sighed heavily. "It was fun though! I must say it's more fun than I've had in quite a few years." She stood again, her leg a bit more stable, yet it was shaking like a rattle. "Shockingly this doesn't hurt nearly as much as before. . .I wonder why. . ." she pondered to herself. Her leg had only partially healed, and the reason it hurt was the bone was hitting a bit of muscle in her leg. Now that the bone had snapped into place, her leg was a bit shorter and she'd still have a limp, but it wouldn't hurt nearly so much as it did before.

“Alright, I will. But I must say I’m impressed – it was all I could do to keep up there. Are you alright?” he asked, panting a little. He was glad Hydra’s leg wasn’t hurting her as much, but he couldn’t help wondering why. It seemed strange, and he didn’t entirely understand it in the first place.

He lay down on the ground, letting his wings fall to either side of him as he relaxed, letting his muscles cool off. He loved running like that, but Jackdaww never went fast enough for it to even be possible. However, he was sure that his real enjoyment of the little sprint was getting to spend a little more time with Hydra without Jackdaww bothering them. That was what had made it really special.

She sat down by Measle and licked his cheek with a laugh. "It was quite a lot of fun, Measle. I wouldn't trade your company for anything in the world!" She edged herself under his wing and yawned. "Haven't had a good run in ages, this has been a good day so far." She shut her eyes for a minute or two and listened to the woods around her as a smile crept onto her face. "As for am I alright, I'm perfectly fine. Thank you for asking though, it's nice to know you care." Her face felt warm, but the rest of her felt the same so it didn't seem to be a bad thing. It made her feel all fuzzy inside.

“Of course I care, Hydra – you’re the most important thing to me in the world.” He said softly, wrapping his wing around her as she nestled under it. Somehow he felt electric – more so than usual – and even fuzzier than ever.

“And I wouldn’t trade yours for anything either. You’re just perfect, you know, Hydra. I don’t know what I would have done if we’d never met.” He said, nudging her neck with his nose. He would have been quite happy to leave Jackdaww to find his own way through the forest if it meant he could stay there with Hydra instead, and he didn’t even feel guilty for thinking it.

"I've been lonely most of my life until this point. You make me so happy Measle; I can't really explain it." She relaxed and shut her eyes quietly. "Never thought I'd fall for a dragon so much my opposite. . .Never thought I'd fall for anyone really." She hadn't really felt this loved since she lost her family, and never thought she would ever feel like that again until now. A few stray tears fell from her eyes but she remained happy. "Don't know what I would have done if I hadn't met you either, to be honest. Probably would still be miserable and alone though."

“Well, you know what they say: opposites attract. You don’t have to explain – I understand.” Measle said softly, smiling. He had been so used to being Jackdaww’s pull-along toy dragon that he had almost lost himself. He had become a nanny for the childish man, but Hydra was starting to bring out his full personality. She was good for him, and he was truly happy.

Elsewhere, Jackdaww was growing increasingly fed up with the two loved-up dragons. They were tearing off all over the place, and he barely knew how to keep track of them both. Sighing in frustration, he drew his sword to study the blade as he walked. The delicate engravings around the outside of the handle stretched down into the blade, which meant that, in a real battle, any blood spilled would run through the whole pattern to accent the ruby. However, it was a nightmare to clean.

He gave the blade an experimental swing, and decided he may as well practise while he walked. His training session had been cut short that morning when Hydra had burst into tears, and he’d never caught up on it. He spun the sword through his fingers, before slashing at a fern by his feet. However, as he raised the sword to actually train, he felt it stick into something to his right. He turned cautiously, hoping he hadn’t damaged the blade. That was when the buzzing started.

It was a beehive. Damn. There was a little honey running down his blade, but that wasn’t what he was worried about. He took a quick step back as the bees erupted from the honeycomb, and buzzed frantically around the area. However, before they could attack him for destroying their home, a shadow a little way away from the path seemed to catch the bees’ attention. It was a young bear, by the looks of it, and the smell of honey had drawn it too close to the path. The bees hummed furiously, and made straight for the bear, and all of the angry creatures (bear included) fled into the trees. Jackdaww sighed, hoping that was them dealt with. What he didn’t realise was that the bees were headed straight towards Hydra and Measle.

Measle was just trying to think of something else to say when he heard the commotion approaching through the bushes. The bees had given up their chase, it seemed, but the bear was still fleeing. Its fur was littered with heavy welts from the beestings, and it was not happy. As the shape in the undergrowth became clearer, Measle’s eyes grew wide with fear and understanding.

“Hydra! Watch out!” he cried, leaping to his feet as the bear crashed out onto the path, growling angrily. When it didn’t stop, he ran a few steps closer, placing himself between the bear and Hydra. He couldn’t let it lay a claw on her – he couldn’t bear to see her hurt.

The rest happened quickly – too fast for Measle to really keep track. The bear recognised him as a threat (which he was quite prepared to be if the bear had any intention of harming Hydra) and gave a roar, swinging a big, clawed paw at him. It was young, but it was already bigger than Measle, and the heavy blow caught his chest hard. He hissed, spitting a baby lightning-bolt and watching it singe the bear’s fur. Then, a second blow caught him in the other side of his chest, and knocked the wind out of him. His knees buckled, and his vision went blurry for a second. Then, as the bear swatted at him again, he crumpled completely, falling to the ground. It wouldn’t have taken much to scare the bear off now – a simple roar would have done it now that it’s rage was spent, but Measle’s breath felt uneven and painfully. He couldn’t suck in enough air to roar, so he just lay there in a pathetic heap, trying to keep his consciousness as his ribcage burned with pain.

As everything happened all at once the first thing Hydra did was roar in surprise. She cursed the luck they seemed to be having and got between the bear and Measle. "If you know what's good for you, you'll go away!" She hissed and spat bits of ice like Measle spat lightning and gnashed her teeth. This thing was huge to her, but so was everything else for the most part. Therefore, this was just one more of the same kind of obstacle she'd always faced. "Bring it on hairball! There's nothing I won't hesitate to do to any creature that hurts Measle." There wasn't much she wouldn't do at this point as she had said, but she'd probably still rip something, or a certain skinny little human, a new one later.

“Hydra, stop!” Measle gasped weakly. His vision was seriously messed up by then, and it was going suspiciously dark at the edges where he wasn’t getting enough air, but it was his chest he was most concerned by. It felt like someone had stuck a sword in it, and it was making speaking incredibly difficult. However, no matter how much it hurt to force out words, he didn’t want anything happening to Hydra.

He dimly wished that Jackdaww was there, with his skinny little sword. That would scare the bear off, and stop anything happening to Hydra, but as another stabbing pain went through his ribs he found himself unable to focus on that thought. He gulped helplessly, trying to get up to help, before the darkness at the edge of his vision rushed over him as he passed out.

Jackdaww heard Measle’s roaring hiss as the bear first attacked them, and looked in that direction. It took a moment for him to recognise the distant sound, but when he did, he clamped his hand over his mouth and cursed. He wasn’t sure he actually wanted to see what was going on, but he didn’t have any choice. Slowly he started off down the path, stopping to wipe the honey from his blade. This was probably about the worst thing that could have happened before a training session, all in all.

She gave a mock lunge, figuring if she fought she'd either win with some injuries of her own, or lose and come out alive. Dying was not an option! Since she figured that either Jackdaww would help (little to no real hope with that), or her own aggression would be enough. She took a chance and shouted, "JACKDAWW!" She guarded Measle carefully and kept herself bristled with her wings fanned out to look much bigger than she really was. If she was right he'd come running up and the bear would get scared of the sword that the human kept with him. If she was wrong then the bear would turn on the tiny human and then she'd have to actually attack and risk dying herself.

When he heard Hydra shout, he knew something must really be wrong, and dropped the idea of making his way there slowly. He wasn’t getting the impression that Hydra was overly fond of him, so it would take something serious to make her call him. Or something involving Measle, which all levelled out the same way. He broke into a run, and found his way to the scene unfolding around the two dragons.

Measle was unconscious, Hydra looked particularly aggressive, and the young bear was roaring madly. Yes, it was a grand old mess, and it seemed that he had arrived at just the right moment.

“Hydra, make as much noise as you can – this guy’s only a little one, so it will frighten him.” He said forcefully, drawing his honey-sticky sword from its sheath (which he had hastily thrust it into earlier) and stepping towards the bear. Its eyes looked both frightened and fiery, but the spark of silver seemed to get through its thick skull. It snorted, and backed up a few feet, still roaring and swatting at them all. Jackdaww gave a wordless shout, and threatened the creature with his sword. He didn’t actually want to hurt it – the bees had done enough already judging by the state of the bear’s skin – but he had to look like he was going to. Bear were tricky buggers, especially when they were angry or scared. He could only hope that between him and Hydra there would be enough force to scare it off. It looked like it was starting to retreat, but he couldn’t be certain.

Last edited by ElizaFlame13 on Thu Dec 29, 2011 5:02 pm; edited 1 time in total

Hydra roared as loud as she could and looked at the human. "I don't need to explain my fury." She gave an actual lunge and roared again spitting some ice on the ground. When the bear ran off through the brush she turned to Measle and nudged his cheek with her nose. "M-Measle. . .? Measle wake up. . ." She waited a few minutes and turned to the human. "From the state of your sword. . . Nevermind. . ." She sat watching Measle for a long while and figured she didn't have to voice anything to Jack about this, it would go one of two ways: he'd either confess it was his fault, or he'd apologize for not helping earlier. That was how she saw it, but concern overrode everything else for that moment.

“Yeah, my sword’s a mess, I get that. However, right now I have more important things to deal with: namely the fact that my dragon, and best friend, is lying unconscious on the ground.” Jackdaww said bitterly, throwing his blade to the ground. He hadn’t been in a great mood that day anyway – what with all the lovey, dragony mush all around him – and the whole scene there had just about taken away the last of his humour.

“Measle, are you alright? You gotta get up.” He said, in a much softer voice. He was never sure what to do with unconscious things, especially if they were a heavy lightning storm dragon. He was just hoping that Measle wasn’t too far under.

Measle was fighting to wake up. He was wrapped in a cushion of billowy darkness, but he had dimly heard the noise around him. Slowly, the darkness began to lift and lighten, until he managed to open one eyelid a crack. “Your best friend? You’ve not gone soft on me, have you Jack?” he said, in a voice barely more than a whisper. He could feel his ribs burning, and had a horrible feeling that he had cracked a few, but he could see that Hydra was safe, which made it worth it.

“Erm, no, you must have misheard. You’ve got to lie on your side so you can breathe, mind.” Jackdaww said in embarrassment, trying not to show quite how profoundly relieved he was. If Measle could pick up things like that, he couldn’t be too badly hurt, could he?

Hydra moved a little closer and examined the cuts on his chest before exhaling an icy breath to try and stop any bleeding, as well as diminish swelling. She blocked out the nearly useless human and tried to make Measle a bit more comfortable. So far the only thing she'd done was get herself more worried over her precious companion. She felt useless. Eventually she moved away and lay down sadly. 'If it weren't for me. . .' she thought to herself bitterly.

Measle sighed in relief as the surge of cold air numbed his aching chest for a moment, and managed to roll slightly onto his side. When he did, the large, dark purple patch of the already-swelling bruise became visible, and Jackdaww took in a sharp breath. It looked bad – probably worse than it was – but he wasn’t sure what to do about it.

He had been letting Hydra sort it out, but when she lay down he realised he was actually going to have to help. He’d seen injuries like this before (mostly on himself, come to think of it) but had no idea what was going on under his scales.

As Jackdaww was fretting to himself over what to do, Measle lifted his head slightly, and caught sight of the bruise himself. “Damn, that looks worse that I thought it would.” He said softly, still not daring to breathe in too deeply. However, he could tell it wasn’t anything life-threatening, which was always a good thing.

“Hydra, are you ok?” he asked, making sure that nothing had happened to her while he had been unconscious. It might have been a silly thing to ask, given his current situation, but he had to check.

She walked back over and licked her companion's cheek. "A bit shaken, but I'm alright." She nudged him gently and sighed. "You didn't have to protect me like that, I can handle myself." She looked guilty, and in her eyes it was justified. She felt that he'd gotten hurt for no reason. "Anything I can do to help. . .?" she asked quietly. She figured Jackdaww would tell her to go away and let him fix Measle, but if it came to that she knew she couldn't do it. It just wasn't in her nature to do things that way.

“I know I didn’t, but I couldn’t just let you fight that thing. You’re too important to me.” he said softly, before clearing his throat and giving his head a soft shake. His head was clearing a little, and he could feel what was wrong now. Although he couldn’t tell what was wrong for sure, he knew he had cracked a couple of ribs, and that was what was causing the worst pain. He couldn’t tell how they were broken, but he could still breathe (after a fashion) which meant it couldn’t be too bad.

“I’m not bleeding am I? Across my chest, that it. If theirs is any bubbly blood, it’s not great, but I should be OK.” He said, still softly but very manner-of-factly. He felt fragile, but he didn’t want to seem to pathetic. Jackdaww was chewing his fingernails down to stumps a little way off, and it seemed a bit rude of him to worry either him or Hydra that much.

"I don't see any "bubbling" blood from here." she replied then paused narrowing her eyes. "I can handle a small bear." Her look softened and she glanced away feeling sad. "You shouldn't fight for my safety like that, I might just lose YOU and that's too much to bear. I'll do what I can to numb the pain, but for now you need to rest, and Jackdaww needs reassurance that you're not going to die. I will be right over here just give a shout if you need something, alright?" She quietly wandered over to Jackdaww and looked up at him with wide eyes. "He will be alright, he has to be." she reassured him.

“I’m made of tough stuff, Hydra. You won’t be getting rid of me that easily.” Measle laughed a little, ignoring the stabbing pain from his ribs. He was relieved that they hadn’t punctured the lung – that would have made things a bit complicated, and Jackdaww would never have been able to manage treating it on his own.

The cold coming off Hydra was enough to numb his scales, which leant him enough strength to drag himself to his feet. His balance was shaky, but with a huge effort he managed to stand up properly and face Hydra and Jackdaww. “See? I’m ok.” He said brightly (if quietly). Jackdaww pulled a face, before bursting out laughing.

“And I though I was the accident prone one. I’m glad you’re ok, Measle.” He laughed, nodding in acknowledgement of Hydra’s comment. He had needed reassuring, but it would have killed him to admit it.

She brightened quite a bit and her tail lashed back and forth. Her happiness couldn't be missed in the middle of a tornado. "Nice to see I won't be losing my other half/polar opposite anytime soon." She turned to Jack and tried to play her "cuteness" trick. She snuggled up to the skinny human and did something akin to purring like a cat. "Don't suppose we'll really be going anywhere till he's healed a bit more, correct?" If they weren't she was off to hunt again, if they were, she was still going to hunt but she'd be right peeved at the human for pushing Measle so hard. Was this "love" really so hard for humans to find amongst themselves? She seemed to have found it in a dragon nearly her total opposite; not just in personality, but also in breed.

“I suppose we won’t. I’ll set up a camp near here – there was a clearing not far down the track that would nicely accommodate a fire.” Jackdaww said calmly, giving a little smile. He turned towards the direction of the clearing and started walking briskly. However, he was cut off by an odd, rattling noise behind him, and the words: ‘Jack, that was a big word for you!’. Yes, it was official: Measle was fine. With that thought embedded in his mind, he stormed off to make camp.

“I still can’t get over how adorable that phrase sounds.” Measle said softly, the pain in his ribs flushed away momentarily in a moment of unanticipated warmth. However, he knew that he really had to lie down – if he was lucky he’d be able to keep pace with Jackdaww again within a day or two, but only with the proper amount of sleep and rest.

"It's a pity you can't come with me, I was going to track down that bear." She nudged his shoulder gently and looked up at her brave companion. "I still think you were rather silly risking your neck like that over a small bear." Her face flushed over the word "adorable", and she snorted. "Pah, as if." She shook out her wings and half smiled. "Jack I'm going to scout around and see if I can find anything you can bring down for dinner. I trust you can babysit Measle until I return?" Her tone indicated she was joking, as did the little spark in her eyes as she laughed.

“I don’t need babysitting!” Measle said, pretending to sound hurt, but giving himself away with a little laugh. He smiled and blinked softly at Hydra, before trailing slowly after Jackdaww, limping as he went to favour his cracked ribs. He didn’t want her chasing after the bear, but he hoped that was part of the joke. Even if it wasn’t, he couldn’t stop her once she had an idea in her head.

When he finally arrived in the little camp Jackdaww was starting to set up, it was a mess of branches, twigs and moss. Jackdaww made very tidy, warm shelters, but he didn’t make them neatly. After about an hour, the shelter would look like a woven hut, packed here and there with moss, but right then if was a pigsty. He hoped it would be all nice again for Hydra getting back – he felt like she deserved something more impressive than one of Jackdaww’s piles of sticks.

A couple of hours later she came wandering back and sat down by Measle. "Well it seems there are deer nearby. The animals from across that stream all came over here and they're not far off." She let her wings fall against her sides and rested her head on Measle's shoulder tiredly. "I also chased down some rabbits. Didn't get to eat them though, they got away." She shut her eyes for a little snooze but found herself unable to fully relax. She boiled it down to her still somewhat achy leg and shook off the feeling of unease. "You didn't give Jackdaww any trouble did you?"

“No, I was good.” He replied in a sarcastic voice, smiling. He had fallen asleep for a while when Hydra was off hunting, and during that time the camp had been almost cleared, and a nice shelter was standing between two trees.

“Yes, he was very quiet,” Jackdaww piped up after carefully slotting another stick into the shelter, “so, you had a successful trip, did you?” He was on his best behaviour, Measle could tell, and he was glad. He couldn’t deal with the human’s usual antics in his current state, really. However, the sleep had helped, and as long as he didn’t move they were almost comfortable. However, it would still probably be a day or two before they could continue on their way.

She nodded. "Yep, but for your sake I didn't kill anything. Frostbite and whatnot." With a long yawn she curled her tail around under one of her wings and watched the small human continue his project. "Humans and building things that don't last. . .Why is there such a close correlation I wonder. . ." Little time seemed to have passed when she glanced at Measle. "Need me to cool off that bruise? The less it swells the sooner it'll heal and stop hurting." He was the oddest, craziest dragon she'd met in this part of the world, but that was part of what she liked about him to some extent. He was unique.

» [Syn & Hydra] Little Wandering Child
» The Forest of Tarz (Exxor x Eldarwen)
» Measle {Miniture but Mighty}
» :: Mystery of the Godless Forest :: -{Aero, Nen, Spirit, Rogue}-
» Hydra :: A Place In This World