Routine

"All living things have aura, and that aura lets them sense your intent. You need to calm yourself... deep breaths. You're just taking what you need. Whenever you're ready..."

The deer stood unaware as his father's words softly instructed him. Deep breaths. Taking what he needed. Whenever he was ready. He shifted his hand held up at his side, feeling the weight of the knife, unable to get any more comfortable with it. Squinting, he took aim. The deer looked up, though not at the two of them; the sixth sense they'd just discussed. It was starting to feel aware of the danger now, and his muscles seized. Well after his chance had come and gone right before his eyes, he heard the crack of the gunshot right beside him, putting a bullet through the animal's eye.

"So," his father said, stepping out from their vantage point to the carcass, "What was it this time? Afraid it would catch the knife? Expecting a divine hurricane to intervene? Do you have to pee?"

"Fuck you, dad." This earned him a sour look.

Kneeling next to it, the middle-aged man hefted the heavy corpse over his shoulders, after dragging a slight ways from the brain scatter and excrement it left upon death. His mostly brown and red attire made from countless kinds of tanned hides crinkled in appearance but without noise, like a second skin. His goatee and hair were both a heavily darkened brown, so close to black it was nearly imperceptible without looking close. "This is the fourth time this month. If you have a problem with what I'm training you for, you should speak up; otherwise, we keep pushing you toward being a woodsman. Tell me what you want, Crispin."

Crispin Moccasey and his father, Medra Moccasey, began the climb back out of rough basin territory, up toward the only even path through these parts where their camp was. Crispin only looked a bit like his father at this young age of fifteen, inheriting the same hair color but in a shaggier, flatter style that clung to his head rather than the fluffy Wildman mane his dad had. His clothes were made up of more dyed linens with stitched segments and many patches, a mix of browns and dark oranges to blend in the fall. Even in spring, he preferred this wardrobe simply because he was a low-mover as Medra liked to put it; he crept up on prey, took to being out of mind with camouflage to the dirt and fallen leaves over actual cover. His shirt was a short-sleeved, low-collared one over a tighter long-sleeve, a black bandana loosely tied at his head just to keep the sweat from getting into his eyes. His pants were studded at the knees, and his shoes were made for traction.

Crispin took the lead with his father carrying the kill, sheathing one of his three hunting knives at his thigh while the other two were at the small of his back and diagonal over his chest. Catching a branch with one hand, he swung up from below and landed atop it in a crow's hunch. "I'm fine with being a woodsman. I just... It's too damn quiet."

"That's usually what you want when you're stalking your dinner." Medra said. Crispin picked some acorns dangling nearby and absently flung them at his father below one at a time, getting the man to actually start pointing his gun. Crispin smiled while dropping the obnoxious act, inching off the branch to fall in step ahead again.

"When it's quiet, it's too easy to think. I'll be getting ready to make a throw, but it's so silent that it feels like I have all the time in the world. I'll think about what could go wrong... and how I should do this to keep from screwing up, no matter what." Crispin ended his explanation. He still slouched as he gave his dad a glare. "It's nothing like those bullshit examples you brought up back there, either. You've told me about every real concern I can think of out here; Grimm, flash weather, predators, so on..."

Medra awkwardly slung the rifle over his shoulder again, having moved the deer to hang over the other and take aim until his son got the hint from a gun barrel. There had been a time where both of them had thought he wouldn't pull the trigger, but Medra had no problems leaving a graze on the boy now. They had gone over that hill once, with scars on both to prove it. "We'll just have to find some way to make you focus, then."

"That's the problem, actually. When I can hear it raining, I can zombie through all the chores and stuff without a second thought. I've been trying to figure out how to 'zone out' when we go on these food runs. So far, I got nada." Medra didn't look too keen on Crispin's self-improvement goal, but they both dropped it.

"So, uh... Vivily still making you proud, like I don't?"

A hand went to his father's face, blood from the deer along with it. No one batted an eye. "Not now, Crispin. Please."

"It's not that hard to just admit you'll only be happy with me once I kill something, you know." His father looked at him with oak-hued eyes, both angry and sad with that accusation but unable to say anything to it. Crispin shut his mouth and put more space between them both, as was custom lately.

This had been their problem for the past few years. Crispin had turned out to be gifted in many ways, but his aura refused to cooperate; Medra, who had once been a Hunter and the only one of their group with such skills, had wanted to train Crispin into being the next guardian that kept their nomadic unit safe from harm. He had fallen back on choosing someone else; Vivily Culversett, a girl who had come to join their roaming ranks at an early age, and showed promise both physically and spiritually. Crispin, who had still developed during the time Medra hoped to make him an unofficial Huntsman, began teaching him to be a woodsman instead. At some point long ago, these two terms may have meant the same thing, but now a woodsman was a person who ventured out into the wilderness to forage and hunt for food and materials while avoiding Grimm, where Hunters dealt with that danger outright. Crispin would make sure they were fed, among other things –Vivily would keep them all alive, given his dad wasn't around to do it.

Breaking the tree line before a rather thick dirt trail, Crispin caught sight of their various caravans staked down for the sake of safety. The semi-circle of their vehicles contained a great deal of activity inside the curve, where there were fire pits for cooking stations and other temporary setups for work outdoors. Each and every person in the group had something to contribute, aside from the younger children; the nomads just shy of one-hundred strong were often accepted anywhere they went for their odd goods and trinkets, coming out of the blue and leaving just as soon. Vivily was strolling past, as she was supposed to circle the camp when Medra went anywhere.

"Doesn't look like your excursion went so well. Your father?" She said, a sing-song lilt to her voice that always seemed to bounce back and forth; reading her tone was really hard for sarcasm and sincerity alike. With a heavily layered getup of thick furs and bits of underlying armor such as chain mail, It was hard to appreciate any part of her physical femininity even if he wanted to... aside from her face which stunned just about everyone she met; she had these green eyes flecked with blue dots, and her features framed these startlingly pretty eyes with an image out of painted art. Short, curly locks of strawberry-blonde hair completed the look, and a set of very slender glasses seemed to magnify her key feature. At her waist was a sabre-like weapon, an heirloom of Crispin's family denied to him.

Jutting a thumb behind him, Crispin's expression dropped. "Bagged a full-grown doe, probably last you's a few nights. He'll make it up in a minute or two."

"You just left him to catch up to you in such a vulnerable state?" She hissed. He shrugged, turning toward the back end of the caravan formation and walking off without anything to say. Of course, she began to follow. "You need to start taking your work more seriously. Just because you weren't suited to this doesn't mean this job is any less important, Crispin."

"I am serious. Being a glorified errand boy is full of responsibility, you know." His own sarcasm was easy to notice, unlike hers, and she wasn't too fond of it. Vivily moved to his side, even as he tried to improve pace to keep her behind him. "Go do your rounds, or whatever. Take care of your own shit before you pester me about mine."

She gave him another dour look. "You know better than I do that we're in a safe area for the next day or two. You drew the map."

"And somehow, everyone thanks you and dad for being able to rest easy... It's not like I chart us a course away from all the teeth and claws." Crispin shooed her away, and she tried to catch the gesture in order to twist something and subdue him so he might listen. He slithered out from her grasp, and she sighed, hearing the fringe where she ran into Crispin rustle with the passage of his father.

"I'm serious, Crispin. You need to put your right foot forward sometime, sooner better than later."

He began juggling two of his knives closely followed by the last like this would convince her of his commitment, and she just stared at him with a displeased look before stomping off. She was soon within sight where his father arrived from the underbrush, and she helped him with the heavy animal before Crispin set aside the many knives, continuing on his way until he could find the very back cart. He could hear the telltale signs that his acquaintance was nearby upon poking his head in, but vision was poor. "Yo, Tatsu! I can't see you in here!"

The clinking of tools stopped, and out of the pile of assorted appliance parts in the caravan came a boy a bit older than he, sporting a set of grey overalls and a red T-shirt underneath. Grease stained his apparel as well as streaked his red hair, and he shielded his eyes from the light outside that he'd forgone for a poor substitute inside. This small lamp among other things were powered by a hand-cranked dynamo. "Hey, Crispy. How'd the trailblazing go?"

"Same as last time, really."

"Ouch." Tatsu replied. "I suppose you're here to hide out until your pop cools off?"

A smirk formed at the guess. "Would you be sticking around the guy?"

Tatsu nodded. "I see your point... here, check this out. I got that toaster to work."

"We don't even have bread, Tatsu. Good job, though." They flanked the device, which he demonstrated could now generate heat. Tatsu had been orphaned young, and raised for a while by an engineer for heavy-duty equipment, like cranes and bulldozers. After the man had died, Tatsu somehow wound up in with them sooner or later, and fell to what he could find that might tick with this knowledge. Give him a big engine and he could dismantle it in moments, but portable appliances like these took him some tinkering. His help with people's car troubles in the off town they entered usually earned him his keep and then some, and this was more of a hobby to help him get by in between. For a while, he and Tatsu had joked about his last name, as the older boy had forgotten it somewhere down the line; if asked for a full introduction, he referred to himself as 'Tatsu Something'. He occasionally had moments where he thought he was starting to remember, but it had so far evaded him every time.

"I'm like, THIS close to making that model helicopter fly around."

Crispin whistled. "That'll make for some big bucks later. What do you need?"

"I just need to figure out a fix for the split gearshaft." Tatsu glanced at the toy in question, which looked to be ready in all regards.

"I can find you some sap or clay if you need glue." Crispin suggested.

Tatsu gave his head a shake. "It'll take a full replacement. Thanks anyways, Crispy." The handyman watched as his friend stood and made for the door already. "Hungry?"

"Starved."

"Enjoy your picnic, then." Crispin scaled the outside of the caravan while Tatsu opened the hatch in the ceiling, only so they could still talk. Setting down atop the vehicle, Crispin took the small bag off his back and emptied his pockets to find the berries, herbs and other edible things he'd taken from the forest during the outing. He hadn't earned a meal in the case of the deer, so he would get none out of it; his consistent failure to do this had made him nearly vegetarian by now. Sitting cross-legged on his perch, he chewed on the end of a sanguine sprout, letting the bitter taste spread. Vivily, Medra, and his stepmother would be eating mouth-watering venison that night.

As the sun set, the camp was lively as ever, and Crispin ate his meager rations while watching his 'family' scurry about. Nothing really seemed out of place, but something was nagging at the back of his conscience...