Chapter Forty-Two: Blade and Kokiri
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Kokiri was down at the beach again. Except he was actually in the water this time, letting some little fishies swim up to him and around his feet before he plunged in and attacked. It was only small game, crawfish and shellfish that he mostly caught. Then he spotted bigger game further out and dove in, swimming under its sight. He'd left his glasses on the shore with his shoes so has not to ruin the suede felt.
He swam gently, not making much ripples lest he alert his target. Once he was down and behind, he swam upwards with his arms poised to grab. His fingers each bearing 2 1/2 in claws and reached out and snatched the large fish in them and then bit its head off. All while still under the water.
He put his prize in his mouth and swam to different waters, leaving a trail of blood in his wake.
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Blade had finally reached the beach and collapsed near the brother's shoes, out of breath. Cursing when he saw the brother dive into the ocean and swim out. He shouted as loud as he could, both with his mouth and with his magic but the brother seemed preoccupied with his little hunt.
"Damn fox," he panted. "You had to go on a hunt now?"
He rolled onto his back and closed his eyes against the sun and just listened to the ocean crashing against the shore, lulling him into a relaxed state. He sent out a little sonar with every crash, seeing it in his black world and unintentionally falling asleep.
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Kokiri had turned into his blue fox form and munched away on his fish, wolfing large pieces down before he was spotted and had to fight for it or fend off annoying sea gulls. He had traveled further north, swimming with a couple pods of orcas along the way.
When he finished, he licked his chops, cleaned his paws and went on a light stroll down south along the shoreline, watching the sun set. He eventually sat down to rest and thought about his past. The ocean held a lot of memories for him. His uncle had raised him in the old family home until he was eight when the storm hit and sunk the mansion, taking the little sand-bar of an island with it.
He was shore bound when he met Chug for the first time, before they became brothers. His grandparents were both from the Ocean Kingdom and he practically lived in the water.
He lied down and thought back the past few days. Blade had yet to claim he and his brothers a master, Torch was unofficially adopted by Chug, the totems had made yet another attack and the little Toulons never knew.
Jester had been excelling in the martial arts and was becoming more confident around the spiders and scorpions, as long as it was the little ones. Pinhead was going into mechanics and Tunneler into paramedics.
Those two didn't surprise him one bit when they had turned down their magic cores. They seemed more down to earth than Blade or Six Shooter. Blade, once his magic had accepted him as its master it had slowly grew from the excess particles. But then there was a sudden upsurge in it and he took him under his wing to help balance it. That was what all the meditations and practicals were for. He was teaching him how to utilize it to both his benefit and protection.
Six Shooter was another matter. He was still determined to make Torch his general for his army of living puppets. His human level had gone down a few notches, but he wasn't getting anything done with his foolish attempts. Whoever this Sutekh person was, he was obviously important to Six's past, and not just because he'd stolen the original elixir. Six still had something against this villain. Enough to still want to wage war.
His little snippets of the magical world going into stagnation was somewhat true. The magicals were going into stagnation, and because of their stubbornness and unwillingness to change, he and Chugs had had to come down and cart them off to a world where they could shut up and stop bitching.
Chug made the story sound better, but that was what was really happening. It was always, "Back in MY day this," or "back in MY day that,". He seriously wanted to just rip their heads off and stuff them up their back door. But they weren't human enough and most were innocent. Chug had always told him to respect the elderly but it was hard to do so when the elderly didn't even remember their own rebellious youth.
He'd come up with their whiny solutions on accident when he abducted a family and planted them on another planet. Chug had found out about it and checked on the "poor family". They thanked and praised them endlessly and only wished that the rest of their family could have joined. He protested loudly saying that his ship was NOT a taxi. Then the damn people had tried to pay their way in, and after that it was the rich and wealthy that started to complain and had deemed themselves insulted that they were not the first.
Kokiri had slipped in his control and pulverized the Heads of those so-called "noble houses". He didn't kill anybody, just went on a rampage. Snobs, they were as revolting as women.
He shivered and decided to head back to the hotel and see what everyone was up to. He seemed to recall that one of Chug's securities had gone off and then there was a loud boom in the green house.
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Blade had woken up when a wave had crashed on him and pulled him away from the shore a bit. He sat up and sputtered when another waved crashed down on him and pulled him further. He got up and ran further inland, he did not scramble away in a panic (he totally did).
He shivered and hugged himself for warmth, very glad that he had a hand now to do so. He looked around and noticed that it was night time. He'd slept all day on the beach! He looked over at the shore but didn't see the brother anywhere. He sent out a pulse for a better search but the brother wasn't there.
A wave crashing and shuffling fur later had him staring straight ahead into the green eyes of a blue fox.
"About time! Do you have any idea how long I've been waiting here?!" he screamed.
The fox walked up next to him before shaking its fur vigorously, making Blade even more wet.
"Stop it! I'm soaked enough as it is! I don't want to catch cold and spend more time in bed." Blade grumbled and took his hat off to shake the water off.
The fox lied down and dropped its head on him.
"Hey! Get off me!" Blade grunted and tried to crawl out but only managed to bury himself deeper. "Look, the reason I wanted to see you is because I accidentally destroyed your brother's plants." he said, ditching the escape attempt.
The fox stood up and walked over the pair of shoes and glasses Blade was near and turned back into the brother, his three pointed tail disappearing completely. He put the shoes on and picked up the glasses, putting back on his face. He strode over to Blade and picked him up, gathering all the water from him and adding every drop to himself.
"All dry." he said and let Blade float by his side as they headed back to the hotel.
"Did you not just hear what I said? I destroyed your brother's plants! Now he's gonna make me watch a full Barney marathon!" Blade nearly shouted.
"Yes, I heard you. But if you explain why you destroyed them he might let you off." Kokiri said.
"Really? You swear?" Blade asked, holding out his hand.
"I swear. It's not like it's anything major anyway. He's got a dozen green houses. What's the loss?" Kokiri shrugged.
"Medicinal and culinary plants is the loss." Blade answered.
"What part of the wall?" Kokiri asked.
"The part that was facing the ocean, of course." Blade answered in a snit.
"Oh, well, not to worry. If the plants are still green when we get there we just need to repot them. No harm done." Kokiri said.
"I blew up the wall this afternoon!" Blade shouted.
"You're still in the safe zone, don't worry so much." Kokiri said and spotted the broken wall of the green house. "Blimey, you did a number didn't you?" he chuckled.
"I fail to see the humor." Blade grumbled, crossing his arms.
"Seriously, you worry too much." Kokiri said and with a wave of his hand the wall was repaired, the plants back in their repaired pots and watered. "One of these days when I know your core can handle the stress, I'm gonna teach you how to fix things." he said and they headed towards the lounge room.
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