Post by Pavane on May 29, 2010 2:47:26 GMT -5
Characters:
Fennel - female Raccoon
Aolani - female Swan
Setting:
Crooked Brook - Mid Spring (RL day 5)
-----------------------------------
The underbrush rustles, quivering around a line of motion that finally emerges in the form of Fennel, pausing on the bank of the stream and then leaping down onto a round stone sticking out of the water. She stares into the water, tilting her head to one side. "Here, now? Now is the time to be here. So I hear, do you hear?" she murmurs, talking to... who knows?
Aolani is further up the creek looking for food. She pulls her head up out of the water, with a small fish in her beak, which she quickly swallows whole. She hears a voice then and twists her head around to look, spotting a familiar raccoon standing on a stone in the river, looking down into the water and talking to herself apparently. She swims over to the side of the stone Fennel is standing on, and looks down at the same spot, tilting her head a bit in confusion.
The spot seems to be much like any other - clear water splashing over the stones, and the occasional silvery fish or tadpole swimming through it. Fennel stares down at it, seeming oblivious to the approach of Aolani, and flicks her tail from side to side. "Not here? Should be here. Unreliable!" she continues, not even looking up at the swan.
Aolani even stretches her neck out to the point where her head is right over the spot that Fennel is looking at, and now she could likely see the reflection of the swan head above her. After continuing to listen to the raccoon though and see nothing in the water, she finally gives up and asks. "What are you looking for?"
Fennel tilts her head in the other direction at the reflection in the water. "Is that you?" she asks it. "Are you clever with your disguises?" There's no answer from the reflection, of course, but there is from the actual swan floating nearby, and she lifts up her head, giving a little chuff. "I told the crawfish to come here. Tasty little crawfish with crunchy shells. But they haven't come. Very unreliable."
Aolani blinks and tilts her head as she pulls it back, her neck taking a slight 's' shape. "Crawfish? What is a crawfish? Wait... you can talk to fish?"
Fennel grins broadly. "A crawfish is a tasty! Crunchy shell like a beetle, lives in water like a fish, little claws that snap if you don't snap them first!" She licks her lips, thinking on that taste. "I'm good at talking! I talk to many, many things. Different words are for different things!"
Aolani thinks about his description for a bit, then suddenly realizes what he's talking about. "Oh, those things. I tried eating one but couldn't figure out how to get through that shell. I kept poking it hard with my beak, but it didn't work, just kept trying to snap at me with it's claws. When it got my leg once, that hurt, so I left it alone."
Fennel nods her head. "Crawfish have snapping-words. Almost as sharp as cat-words," she says. "When I find them, I snatch them up..." and she lunges with her forepaws into the water, bringing up - well, nothing, actually. "And then I snap their backs!" She makes the motion with her handlike paws, "And then there's tasty crawfish for eating." She stares at those empty paws, and sighs. "But they didn't come, today. Maybe I won't come when they invite me. Serve them right."
Aolani blinks, looking rather confused again. "You invited them to come here? Why would they come if you are going to eat them? That's crazy, it would be like me climbing down into a wolves den."
Fennel tilts her head to one side, blinking a little as though she's perplexed. The raccoon and logic have never exactly been on the same side of the stream as each other... "Why wouldn't they? They're tasty for eating. So I should eat them!" Never mind that a wolf could use that same argument about her.
Aolani giggles a little at her response. "Yes, I'm sure they are, but I would think that they don't want to get eaten any more than you or I would."
That takes Fennel a few moments to think through. When she finally replies, she sounds almost plaintive. "But I invited them. Wolves don't invite me places..." Then her eyes widen, and she adds, "A cougar did, though. But he had sharp teeth."
Aolani gives up trying to reason with the raccoon, but gets an idea. "Hmm, maybe I would be able to find one for you, then you can break it open and we can share it." She figures she can probably swim better than Fennel, and her long neck is pretty good for reaching things underwater.
Fennel perks right up at the prospect of getting some crawfish. "Good plan! Clever plan. If they don't come here, we go to them!"
Aolani nodded and went swimming down the creek a bit, plunging her head underwater to look for any crawfish. After a bit of looking, she still hasn't found any, but she pulls her head back up to take a breath, and goes back to looking for them again.
Fennel swishes her tail from side to side, and then sits down on the rock. Her tailtip falls into the water, and she jumps up in surprise, spinning around to see what made it wet and nearly falling off the rock. Some help she is. Underneath the water, meanwhile, the currents flow around small rocks - and something small and brownish with red speckles scuttles from one of those stones to the next.
Aolani spots the crawfish scuttling across the riverbed and quickly swims after it, her head remaining underwater as she holds her breath, kicking her webbed feet hard. She catches up with it quickly, and snaps down with her beak, clamping down on one of it's claws. She then pulls the crawfish out of the river and tosses it over to the riverbank toward where Fennel is.
Oh! Hey! What's that flying through the air towards her? Fennel almost misses it, apparently intent on figuring out what it is that's made her tail all wet, but fortunately the moving object catches her attention - and the crawfish is somewhat stunned upon landing on the bank, giving her a moment to pounce towards it and snatch it up in her paws, one of them around its tail, the other just behind the head. Her paws jerk apart just as the stunned crustacean starts to recover and flail its claws to try and get a grip, and she snaps the armored body in half, just where the tail meets the thorax. It stops wiggling.
While she begins swimming over to the bank, Aolani watches as Fennel pounces upon the crawfish and kills it instantly just when it's starting to try and fight back. She climbs up onto the river bank and walks over toward Fennel and the crawfish that was now to be their food. She was quite curious what it would taste like. "Wow, it's that easy when you have paws? Maybe next time I'll try stepping on it and pulling it apart with my beak..."
Fennel grins, and nods her head. "Clever paws! Raccoon paws are for catching and taking and being clever with. Maybe if you get the tail in your beak and pull, that works. Worth trying!" She holds out one half of the crawfish in each paw. "Tail-half or head-half?" she asks.
Aolani nods and thinks she'll have to remember that, assuming she finds that she likes the taste of these strange shell fish. At the question of which half she wanted, she looks back and forth between the two, in a bit of a dilemma as she can't decide, but eventually she just goes with the tail end and taps it with her beak. "I'll take tail."
Fennel opens her paw, offering that tail up to the swan, lifting the head to her muzzle and licking at the open end of it. The flesh inside is pale, almost translucent - it looks a lot like fish does, except for that shell around the outside. The flavor is similar to fish as well, but lighter and less... well, fishy.
Aolani takes the tail in her beak, then sets it down on the ground, holding it in place with one foot as she digs out the fleshy insides with her beak. Soon all the meat is gone and she tries to look inside. "Hmm, looks like I'm done. Your right, they are pretty tasty."
Fennel digs her muzzle in to get at the flesh, and pulls a few bits of it out with her other forepaw, as well, licking her fingers afterwards. "Yes! Tasty, tasty crawfish. Even if they don't listen to invitations."
Aolani giggles again at Fennel. "Well, if I was a crawfish, I wouldn't either. Getting eaten is not fun."
Fennel hmms, tilting her head to the side. "How do you know? Have you been eaten?"
Aolani shakes her head. "Well, no, I haven't, but being eaten tends to mean that you die, which is not a good thing..."
Fennel considers on that. "Hmm. Maybe you're right. Someday, maybe I try it, and then tell you. Then you'll know!" Never mind the problems inherent - downright rampant - in that plan.
Aolani blinks, looking rather shocked. "What do you mean you'll try it and tell me? If your dead, you won't be able to tell anyone anything. There won't be a 'you' anymore."
Fennel chffs. "I'm good at talking! Just need different words. Find out dead-words, use them to talk. Everything has words. Why not death?"
Aolani shakes her head, trying to think of a way to explain. "Nothing talks when it's dead. You will be like the crawfish we just ate, just laying there, never to move or do anything again."
Fennel peers down at the empty shell. She hmms, and pokes it with one paw, watching how it moves only when she nudges it. "Dead-words are quiet-words." She leans her head down, putting her ear right up against that shell and listening carefully. She considers another moment, then grins. "I know! Crawfish is in our bellies now. We can hear it there! It must be, because sometimes dead things make stomachs sad, and sometimes happy. Bellies are like ears for dead things!"
Aolani laughs and shakes her head once more. "Fennel, you are certainly one of a kind. I will tell you that." She says simply and sits down in the grass. She then looks down at the tail of the crawfish and quickly tosses it into the river.
Fennel grins, and nods. "Am one of raccoons! Raccoons are a kind." Not exactly what the swan meant, of course - after all, not all raccoons are quite so... odd. She sits down nearby, watching as the tailshell floats down along the river, and a few little fish swim up to start nibbling at the little specks of meat that are still stuck on it.
Aolani yawns and stretches her wings a bit. "Well Fennel, I think I'm getting sleepy now, so I'm going to take a nap. Hope we can meet again soon." She says warmly, then tucks her head under one of her wings and begins to drift off to sleep.
Fennel nods her head, bobbing it up and down. "Okay. Sleep well, Aolani! Good dreams!"
Fennel - female Raccoon
Aolani - female Swan
Setting:
Crooked Brook - Mid Spring (RL day 5)
-----------------------------------
The underbrush rustles, quivering around a line of motion that finally emerges in the form of Fennel, pausing on the bank of the stream and then leaping down onto a round stone sticking out of the water. She stares into the water, tilting her head to one side. "Here, now? Now is the time to be here. So I hear, do you hear?" she murmurs, talking to... who knows?
Aolani is further up the creek looking for food. She pulls her head up out of the water, with a small fish in her beak, which she quickly swallows whole. She hears a voice then and twists her head around to look, spotting a familiar raccoon standing on a stone in the river, looking down into the water and talking to herself apparently. She swims over to the side of the stone Fennel is standing on, and looks down at the same spot, tilting her head a bit in confusion.
The spot seems to be much like any other - clear water splashing over the stones, and the occasional silvery fish or tadpole swimming through it. Fennel stares down at it, seeming oblivious to the approach of Aolani, and flicks her tail from side to side. "Not here? Should be here. Unreliable!" she continues, not even looking up at the swan.
Aolani even stretches her neck out to the point where her head is right over the spot that Fennel is looking at, and now she could likely see the reflection of the swan head above her. After continuing to listen to the raccoon though and see nothing in the water, she finally gives up and asks. "What are you looking for?"
Fennel tilts her head in the other direction at the reflection in the water. "Is that you?" she asks it. "Are you clever with your disguises?" There's no answer from the reflection, of course, but there is from the actual swan floating nearby, and she lifts up her head, giving a little chuff. "I told the crawfish to come here. Tasty little crawfish with crunchy shells. But they haven't come. Very unreliable."
Aolani blinks and tilts her head as she pulls it back, her neck taking a slight 's' shape. "Crawfish? What is a crawfish? Wait... you can talk to fish?"
Fennel grins broadly. "A crawfish is a tasty! Crunchy shell like a beetle, lives in water like a fish, little claws that snap if you don't snap them first!" She licks her lips, thinking on that taste. "I'm good at talking! I talk to many, many things. Different words are for different things!"
Aolani thinks about his description for a bit, then suddenly realizes what he's talking about. "Oh, those things. I tried eating one but couldn't figure out how to get through that shell. I kept poking it hard with my beak, but it didn't work, just kept trying to snap at me with it's claws. When it got my leg once, that hurt, so I left it alone."
Fennel nods her head. "Crawfish have snapping-words. Almost as sharp as cat-words," she says. "When I find them, I snatch them up..." and she lunges with her forepaws into the water, bringing up - well, nothing, actually. "And then I snap their backs!" She makes the motion with her handlike paws, "And then there's tasty crawfish for eating." She stares at those empty paws, and sighs. "But they didn't come, today. Maybe I won't come when they invite me. Serve them right."
Aolani blinks, looking rather confused again. "You invited them to come here? Why would they come if you are going to eat them? That's crazy, it would be like me climbing down into a wolves den."
Fennel tilts her head to one side, blinking a little as though she's perplexed. The raccoon and logic have never exactly been on the same side of the stream as each other... "Why wouldn't they? They're tasty for eating. So I should eat them!" Never mind that a wolf could use that same argument about her.
Aolani giggles a little at her response. "Yes, I'm sure they are, but I would think that they don't want to get eaten any more than you or I would."
That takes Fennel a few moments to think through. When she finally replies, she sounds almost plaintive. "But I invited them. Wolves don't invite me places..." Then her eyes widen, and she adds, "A cougar did, though. But he had sharp teeth."
Aolani gives up trying to reason with the raccoon, but gets an idea. "Hmm, maybe I would be able to find one for you, then you can break it open and we can share it." She figures she can probably swim better than Fennel, and her long neck is pretty good for reaching things underwater.
Fennel perks right up at the prospect of getting some crawfish. "Good plan! Clever plan. If they don't come here, we go to them!"
Aolani nodded and went swimming down the creek a bit, plunging her head underwater to look for any crawfish. After a bit of looking, she still hasn't found any, but she pulls her head back up to take a breath, and goes back to looking for them again.
Fennel swishes her tail from side to side, and then sits down on the rock. Her tailtip falls into the water, and she jumps up in surprise, spinning around to see what made it wet and nearly falling off the rock. Some help she is. Underneath the water, meanwhile, the currents flow around small rocks - and something small and brownish with red speckles scuttles from one of those stones to the next.
Aolani spots the crawfish scuttling across the riverbed and quickly swims after it, her head remaining underwater as she holds her breath, kicking her webbed feet hard. She catches up with it quickly, and snaps down with her beak, clamping down on one of it's claws. She then pulls the crawfish out of the river and tosses it over to the riverbank toward where Fennel is.
Oh! Hey! What's that flying through the air towards her? Fennel almost misses it, apparently intent on figuring out what it is that's made her tail all wet, but fortunately the moving object catches her attention - and the crawfish is somewhat stunned upon landing on the bank, giving her a moment to pounce towards it and snatch it up in her paws, one of them around its tail, the other just behind the head. Her paws jerk apart just as the stunned crustacean starts to recover and flail its claws to try and get a grip, and she snaps the armored body in half, just where the tail meets the thorax. It stops wiggling.
While she begins swimming over to the bank, Aolani watches as Fennel pounces upon the crawfish and kills it instantly just when it's starting to try and fight back. She climbs up onto the river bank and walks over toward Fennel and the crawfish that was now to be their food. She was quite curious what it would taste like. "Wow, it's that easy when you have paws? Maybe next time I'll try stepping on it and pulling it apart with my beak..."
Fennel grins, and nods her head. "Clever paws! Raccoon paws are for catching and taking and being clever with. Maybe if you get the tail in your beak and pull, that works. Worth trying!" She holds out one half of the crawfish in each paw. "Tail-half or head-half?" she asks.
Aolani nods and thinks she'll have to remember that, assuming she finds that she likes the taste of these strange shell fish. At the question of which half she wanted, she looks back and forth between the two, in a bit of a dilemma as she can't decide, but eventually she just goes with the tail end and taps it with her beak. "I'll take tail."
Fennel opens her paw, offering that tail up to the swan, lifting the head to her muzzle and licking at the open end of it. The flesh inside is pale, almost translucent - it looks a lot like fish does, except for that shell around the outside. The flavor is similar to fish as well, but lighter and less... well, fishy.
Aolani takes the tail in her beak, then sets it down on the ground, holding it in place with one foot as she digs out the fleshy insides with her beak. Soon all the meat is gone and she tries to look inside. "Hmm, looks like I'm done. Your right, they are pretty tasty."
Fennel digs her muzzle in to get at the flesh, and pulls a few bits of it out with her other forepaw, as well, licking her fingers afterwards. "Yes! Tasty, tasty crawfish. Even if they don't listen to invitations."
Aolani giggles again at Fennel. "Well, if I was a crawfish, I wouldn't either. Getting eaten is not fun."
Fennel hmms, tilting her head to the side. "How do you know? Have you been eaten?"
Aolani shakes her head. "Well, no, I haven't, but being eaten tends to mean that you die, which is not a good thing..."
Fennel considers on that. "Hmm. Maybe you're right. Someday, maybe I try it, and then tell you. Then you'll know!" Never mind the problems inherent - downright rampant - in that plan.
Aolani blinks, looking rather shocked. "What do you mean you'll try it and tell me? If your dead, you won't be able to tell anyone anything. There won't be a 'you' anymore."
Fennel chffs. "I'm good at talking! Just need different words. Find out dead-words, use them to talk. Everything has words. Why not death?"
Aolani shakes her head, trying to think of a way to explain. "Nothing talks when it's dead. You will be like the crawfish we just ate, just laying there, never to move or do anything again."
Fennel peers down at the empty shell. She hmms, and pokes it with one paw, watching how it moves only when she nudges it. "Dead-words are quiet-words." She leans her head down, putting her ear right up against that shell and listening carefully. She considers another moment, then grins. "I know! Crawfish is in our bellies now. We can hear it there! It must be, because sometimes dead things make stomachs sad, and sometimes happy. Bellies are like ears for dead things!"
Aolani laughs and shakes her head once more. "Fennel, you are certainly one of a kind. I will tell you that." She says simply and sits down in the grass. She then looks down at the tail of the crawfish and quickly tosses it into the river.
Fennel grins, and nods. "Am one of raccoons! Raccoons are a kind." Not exactly what the swan meant, of course - after all, not all raccoons are quite so... odd. She sits down nearby, watching as the tailshell floats down along the river, and a few little fish swim up to start nibbling at the little specks of meat that are still stuck on it.
Aolani yawns and stretches her wings a bit. "Well Fennel, I think I'm getting sleepy now, so I'm going to take a nap. Hope we can meet again soon." She says warmly, then tucks her head under one of her wings and begins to drift off to sleep.
Fennel nods her head, bobbing it up and down. "Okay. Sleep well, Aolani! Good dreams!"