On The Road, Again
Wolf doesn't know how it came to this.
No, that's a small fib- she very, very much knows how it came to this, she just can't really believe it yet. After trading names with the wolf-person - Klein, he has a name and is speaking Mandarin, come on - he made a fuss about the 'wyvern' going to smell up the place. So, she asked if she can take care of it, after she carves out some samples of its hide. He gave her a weird look, then harrumphed - just like Rahool does, on occasion, which was hilarious - and said offhandedly that the meat is edible, too. So, after taking her knife to it, she has a couple dozen kilos of hide to have Ghost examine for later, then a few pounds of lizard meat to cook up.
When she looked up from her now finished carving, it takes her a moment to spot where the old wolf went off to. Off to the side, opposite of the entrance she used, is a small hut of sorts. It has an almost natural camouflaged look to it, with wood and moss blending in with it's surroundings to look like an odd collection of trees at most viewing angles. Probably downright invisible to the naked eye, from up above.
Well, the extremely wide tree probably ruins any secrecy, but that's besides the point they seem to be going for, here.
Walking up to the hut - and thankfully away from the weird magic glowing tree/tombstone - she can smell a fire coming from inside of it. Peeking her head inside, she's greeted with a... spartan living. There's a pit off to the side, with a slat in the roof above it to vent out the smoke, a pile of cloth in the corner arranged like some sort of nest. There's also a table and chair in the corner (which looks to be built by human hands, but looks can be deceiving) with some items littering it, and a sort of trunk/basket tucked away beside it. She's just glad that it's dry, inside.
And of course, the wolf of the hour, Klein, is doing something with a weird blue energy, and as he waves his sleeve-covered hand once more in the air, the fire seems to breathe with life, flaring up to a more respectable height. She knocks twice on the entryway, and he waves her in while he hobbles his way over to the chair, carefully dragging it closer to the fire. It was right about then that she notices the floor, which is a very soft earth with plenty of paw prints covering it.
Hm.
"I don't detect any electrical currents in Klein's... dwelling." Ghost privately tells her. "Also, that hide you picked up might be more useful than I first thought. It's a natural high-ballistics resistant material. Might be fairly resistant to burning, too, if your knives meant anything."
"Might make a cloak out of it. Or a pair of boots. Might've been the first time I died to a bite..." She shake her head slightly, then notices the hard look coming from Klein. "Right. Save this conversation for later." Out loud, she says, "What, no chair for your guest?" She gives a grin that she would imagine most hunters would give, when they try to win people over with roguish charm.
"No."
...she's still learning. Yeah, that's it. She takes the three steps needed to get close to the fire, then plops herself down next to it. She goes and takes off her partially-soaked gloves, the Awoken material doing a fine job of both keeping her temperature regulated and her skin dry. After about a minute of fiddling with them, she holds her hands out to the fire.
Another minute of silence, with her glancing at Klein and said wolf staring at the fire, she clears her throat. "Um, thanks?"
All that earned was a stare she couldn't read on his... alien? Canine? Yeah, his canine face. Weird.
She takes it as an unasked question. "For letting me in. I get the feeling that I'm unwanted for reasons outside of my control."
The corner of his muzzle twitches, almost like he wants to... snarl. Or smirk. "Right to the heart of the matter, eh?"
She nods her head sagely. "Indeed." She fixes him with a look. "From what I can guess, humanity around here weren't too kind to you and yours?"
"Yes." His eyes harden.
That's... a hard pill to swallow. If it wasn't for the fact that she's talking to a magic space wolf right now, she'd laugh at that. Golden Age humans, subjugating others? They were kind to each other on a large scale. Kind. Not like pre-Traveller humanity, or some warlords back in the post-collapse, like Citan. They're not like the Cabal, and their bloody conquests for conquering everything under their boots.
She feels confident in feeling doubt. "They are human, right? Not some weird people that smell like me, or something?"
"I'm certain, human."
"That's..." Huh. She feels troubled? Probably something like that. "I'm sorry, Klein, but I'm having a hard time believing it. Something bad did happen to your people, I know- I had to walk through that ruin on my way here. But the humanity I know wouldn't just up and do something like that."
The last bit makes him huff. "It wasn't a spur of the moment thing, human. It's been going on since before my time. Now where did you put that meat?"
Wolf barely heard that last part through that little revelation, asking Ghost for a pound and a clean glove. With a flash of blue, a sizeable chunk of red wyvern cut slapping into an open gloved palm.
Some time passes, with her mostly preparing the sudden stew while the old wolf mutters to himself here and there. The stark change from kind, almost joking old man to bitter is contrasting. To be fair, it'd probably be something along the lines of a Devil just up and saving her from an ogre, or something.
Mithrax notwithstanding. He rules, hands down.
After fixing up a... soup? Stew? What's the difference, anyhow- Klein says, "How did you get it?"
Wolf looks over to him, setting down the mess kit Ghost pulled from their vault. "Get what?"
"That name. Odd, for a human."
She shrugs. "Helped out Lord Saladin, of the Iron Wolves."
He looks over to her, another unreadable expression on his face. "Thought you said you never saw a wolf before?"
"Nah, he's human... kind of. Treats himself more like a Risen, really."
"Then why is he an," He pulls a grimace, teeth bared slightly. "Iron wolf?"
"'Was part of a larger faction called the Iron Lords. They helped a lot, back in the day, with keeping the Last Safe City of Earth protected. A while back, though, a... 'plague' called SIVA killed most of them off. I helped avenge the fallen Lords, and he granted me that name." She scrunches up her face. "Technically the full title would make my name Lady Wolf, but that sounds pretentious."
"So you're royalty, then-"
"No." She cuts him off, hotly. "Just... no. I do too much roughing it in the wilderness to be that. More of a soldier, really, with a fancy name."
He tilts his head, seeming to mull over her words. Now that she can get a good look at him, she can see his age. What she thought was naturally gray fur looked to be more brown, once. Now it looks thinner than it once was, and the edges of his face sags slightly. The faces says 'old wolf' while the rest of him says 'old man', with a slight hunch to his back. Would probably look a bit thin, too, if she has to guess. Even his amber-yellow eyes are starting to look a touch glossy, but that's probably an eyesight problem outside of age.
"Ask him if you can pay respects." Ghost's tells her quietly.
Oh. Right. They are at a memorial, after all. "Hey, Klein?" She waits until the old wolf-man turns his head, an inquisitive look on his face. "Is it alright if I pay my respects to them?"
A look of genuine shock crosses his face. "You wanna what?" His accent thickens near the end.
"Y'know, like," She waves her hand back towards the tree. "Say some words, leave an offering, the works?"
His face goes through a myriad of emotions, most she can't recognize, before settling on yet another face she can't judge and noding his head.
Wolf smiles. "Thank you. Nice to see you nodding again."
"What?"
"You, uh, nod a lot when not stressed out."
The observation only seemed to put him off. She thinks. The body seems to say 'wary, but keeping calm' but it doesn't seem to match his face. She'd probably get used to it. Maybe.
A thought springs up in her head. "Hey, so are there more villages out and about? I was looking for one when I crashed, but I've only saw... well, them." The hunter points out to the tree, again.
"There are." He says after a beat.
"...o-kay." She nods. "Do you know where they are?"
It's long, long while before he responds. Even then, he's only muttering to himself. "I need to make a supply run."
...huh. She didn't think she'd be hired for an escort mission. Snatching up her now-dried gloves from next to the fire, she stand up and gives the old wolf a grin. "Well, what're we waiting for? We're burning daylight like this if we keep sitting around on our arses."
"...tomorrow." He huffs. "It's late, and the fight took a lot out of me. I need my rest."
"Oh. Right." She sits back down on the floor, next to the fire. "Forget people need that."
She barely slept a wink that night. Some part of her thinks that there's going to be more than one of those wyverns, despite Klein's reassurances. So, with her back to one of the outside walls and her armor firmly back on, she took to her vigil through the whole night. After a couple of hours, the rain stops, the insect come a-chirping and clicking.
Ghost chances leaving their link, once the rain completely stops. Wolf gives him a look. "Done hiding from the rain?" She keeps her voice low, incase Klein is still awake.
"After putting you back together from that bite, yeah. Give me another look, I just want to make sure your armor is alright."
She leans back a bit further, rivulets of rainwater spilling down from folds in her cloak. Doing a preliminary scan of her armor, Ghost clocks in the knife-sized holes in her chest and back, then projects some beams of Glimmer to patch up the holes. As he takes the time to patch it up nicely, he says, "You're going to need to be more careful: we only have so much resources to work with, and that lizard was a bullet sponge."
"...right." She checks the shotgun she's holding, counting the shells. "Might need to use something chambering Void rounds. Good for eating through stuff."
"Not exactly. There," He pulls back a bit, revealing a whole chest piece. "Now that's done, that hide you skinned? It has a faint paracausal resonance to it."
"In english?"
"It's tough. The only reason you cut off it's head was your Light being stronger. Denser? Yeah, denser is a better word."
Wolf perks up. "Well, now I really won't say no to a new pair of boots. If, well, we can find someone who's got a Glimmer-weaver on hand."
Ghost shrugs his fins. "Maybe there's some locals who have a way to do it. Can probably sculpt a rough blueprint. It'll be ugly, but it's possible." He levels the Hunter with a look. "And that's all besides the fact that the wolf people here speak a human language. Not that we should tell him, of course. He might take offense to that."
Wolf takes a moment to think, then slowly says, "If there's a clear disconnect of Mandarin being a human language, then something big must've happened. Maybe the wolf people were once some sort of natives, but they took up that language because of ease of use?"
"That still doesn't explain why they're here in the first place. This planet was supposed to be some super-hot ocean world, not," He rotates around to look at their surroundings, full of saturated green coated in shadow. "This. This shouldn't be here."
"...eh." The Hunter shrugs. "It's not like we're going to find the answers to that sitting on our asses. We have to move around some, get a lay of the land."
"And your brilliant idea was to protect an old man while he does a grocery run? Smooth."
Wolf holds up her hands, pointing the shotgun up. "Hey, I just thought with how he viewed humans, others will too. So, if I went into a village with one that has a nice opinion of me, I can move a bit more freely."
"...oh, that's... actually a decent idea. Good one, Wolf."
She puffs out her chest. "I have my moments." She levels the shotgun back into a ready position. "Now, back to making sure we don't have any more surprises. Motion radar still a no-go?"
Ghost voices a sigh, floating forwards and perching himself inside her hood. "Not until either we get away from that tree, or I suddenly find a way to see through all of this 'mist'. Would love to talk to someone who knows a bit more about all of this, but the old man might have a heart attack if he sees me."
"And calling you Ghost might make him a bit more antsy."
"Yeah, that too." He digs into her shoulder a bit more, clacking against her helmet. "We really need to get better names. Calling you Wolf is probably going to confuse everyone."
She gives him a side-eye. "What's wrong with that? I earned that, damnit." She mutters something else, but Ghost doesn't bother to listen as he laughs softly.
The night continues on, with only a couple more words swapped between the Guardian and her Ghost. When Ghost says that sunrise is closely approaching, she stands up from her vigil next to the hut, meandering her way up to the tree. It's height isn't mutch to talk about, but the circumference is something that rivals those trees she saw on a small resource hunt in that small island off the southern tip of Africa- what was it called? Madagascar? Yeah, that one. Still shorter, though.
Even as she approaches, she can feel that feeling in the air brush against something in her- her Light?- and the glow still feels off-putting. Fishing inside of one of her pouches, she pulls out the slightly muddy, spent shells of the Perfect Paradox, finding a relatively flat root to set them on. Taking a step back and looking at them, she debates adding more, nods, then asks Ghost for something. Cupping her hands together, Ghost deposits a small handful of bright, glowing dust, infused with latent Light from the Traveler itself.
Carefully, as to not waste a single mote, she slowly pours it into the shells, then scatters the excess around the offering. Then, with a deep breath in, she reaches in for her Solar Light, timing it with each breath to bring it forth into her hands. Keeping it full of passion, staving off any rage for those lost and preserving what they might have done in life, the Hunter floods the glowing dust with her Solar, bringing forth a glow that's almost blinding for a split second, then slowly fades away.
Taking one last breath in and out, she sits back, kicking her feet out and resting her arms on her knees. Looking at the bright dust mixed with Solar almost makes the shells look like candles, in a way. She doesn't carry any, but this might be a better substitute, if she says so herself.
She clears her throat. "Uh, hey. I'm new around here, they call me The Young Wolf, back where I'm from. I know, I look human, and it's probably some form of sacrilege, but wolves hold a special meaning in my people's hearts. They're one of the animals that managed to survive the Collapse, for one, so that makes them fairly badass- pardon my language- and Saladin took them up in his image. Through the Dark Ages, they were a symbol of protection, that as long as the Wolves kept guarding the Last Safe City, then we could survive."
"Now, I know most of what I said didn't mean much to you, but from someone who spent all their lives to protect those who couldn't... I feel like I failed, seeing this." She gestures to the tree. "I was so far away, and yet... I can't help but feel like I could've stopped this. Caught whoever was responsible and have justice served. I can't do that."
"But I can make sure you have the last word. That you didn't exist in vain. I have experience in that. Maybe it's not my place, but somebody needs to do the talking. Might as well have it be a wolf."
The tree doesn't respond, just continues pulsing that feeling around her.
It's not long before, without her noticing, again, the voice of Klein softly says, "Hope you're used to silence. It's all I've ever gotten."
Wolf breathes out sharply through her nose. "You have no idea..." She stands up, brushing off her cloak. "So, are you gonna use every chance you get to spook me? Because it's working. I hate it."
There's a flash of some expression on his face, but it's gone before she could decipher it. Instead, he looks to her offering, tilting his head in a very canine fashion. "What's this, now?"
"It's a long story. Thought I'd give them a bit of love, some words and a promise."
"A promise?"
"Eh," She twists her hand a bit. "More of a vow. Hunters are more heavy on vows, really."
"What's this about a vow?"
"Oh, right, should probably change cloaks for this. Hm..." She thinks on it, then asks Ghost to swap out her current one with a brown, slightly tattered. In a flash of transmat, the Awoken material is swapped out for the battered old thing. She waits for Klein to stop raising his hackles to speak again. "Sorry, transmat to those uninitiated is a bit jarring. Now, this cloak I'm wearing? Cloaks have meaning, you know. Want to know this one's name?"
She watches as he adopts a confused look. "You name your cloaks?"
"No, the cloaks get named for what they stand for. This kind, right here? End Unsung. It's for those who lost their lives out in the wild."
He doesn't respond, seeming to lose himself to the answer she gave him. It goes quiet for a bit longer, with the sounds of an autumn forest being the only thing to keep the silence at bay.
Then she claps her hands, holstering her Paradox to do so. "Alright, road trip time! Let's get going, ya old wolf."
An object suddenly hits her head, the suddenness of it actually throwing her off for a solid second. Looking at the impromptu projectile reveals a sack, made out of cloth and well worn. Looking up, the Hunter is introduced to what a wolf would look like if they can look smug.
The words slowly leave her mouth. "D-... did you just throw-"
He hobbles his way past her, "If you're gonna talk like that, then you get to help lighten my load, Lady Wolf. Or is the bag too heavy for you?"
Sensing a dare in the air, she slings the bag over her shoulder. "It's going to take a lot more than this to slow me down. And don't call me a Lady, that just sounds wrong, bloody hell."
Traveling with a civilian is a... unique experience. On the one hand, their travel time is severely diminished, with the stamina of a lightless being nowhere as good as hers. Ghost mentioned that, for someone around his age, he is making good time. Might be something to do with their biology, but without a deep scan from Ghost or an autopsy from a fresh body - which she'd rather not do, thank you very much - it's up to this outlier of a hermit to get info on... keidrans.
Wolf thinks it has a nice ring to it, but it seems a bit out of place in Mandarin. Probably has something to do with all the mystery surrounding this planet, but it's not like she can do anything about it.
Well, unless the next town has a map Ghost can copy, then they'd really be cooking with oil.
Still, a mostly uneventful five days pass, in which she managed to fleece Klein of a few things: he can go, roughly, about three hours of walking for every fifteen minutes he takes a breather; he will hit whoever asks him to help carry his staff, because the thing just looks so heavy and she spotted about thirty different branches that fit the bill better than that old thing and Ghost really, really wants to scan the crystal; the red berries in his bag are, in fact, counted beforehand; his attacks are sudden and made with vicious accuracy to the back of her knees; and, finally, he might be a bit embarrassed to have her as a traveling companion.
How she came upon that juicy info involves a chance encounter she won't soon forget.
It was the fourth day of their travel, and Klein just finished his second break of the day. After a day or so, over a campfire she made with 'surprising efficiency' -Kleins words, not hers - she managed to get a name of the village they are heading towards: Llwynderw. She does not know how to pronounce it, and so does her best to not say it's name aloud. Klein laughed at her, and hurt her feelings greatly.
He was in a sort of spiral of mood swings, where one day he's all grumpy and he genuinely growled at her, which made her instincts tell her to do something about the scary wolf. Then the next he's in a good mood, and he'd tell her some small, offhanded comment about how she should go bathe, because the scent of sweaty human reeks something awful.
She told him that the smell of wet mutt doesn't smell pleasant, either, but she managed to bite her tongue when they first met. She also got a smack from his stick, for that.
It was one of his good days, but then he slowed down. Literally, as in she had to stop when she realized that their lax pace was suddenly too fast for him.
Wolf turned around to face him. "What's wrong? You look like you just stepped on a rusty knife."
"There's someone just up the road. Not many, but I reckon they're probably not going to take kindly to a human walking around in wolf territory."
Wolf was about to say something along the lines of 'she is a wolf, what are you on about?' but the hidden meaning in those words come to her attention. "Wait, why are you saying that like I need to hide, or something?"
"Because you are. I'd rather give you the hint to save yourself the trouble, instead of prowling in unprepared."
"...huh." She tilts her head. "That's kind of you. Thank you, Klein."
"Don't thank me yet, we've got to get through them, first."
It's about another minute or so of walking, when Klein notices that she's making no movement to hide herself. "Wha- what are you doing?"
Ghost puts in his own two silver. "I'm with the talking wolf on this one; what are you planning now, Wolf?"
She smiles, which is hidden from Klein by the helmet. "This."
And through a flush of Void, her body disappears.
Klein's gobsmacked expression is precious. It somehow gets better when she speaks. "Still here, by the by. I'll just show myself when we're alone, again."
He blinks a few times, then slowly raises his staff and pokes her with it. "Invisibility. Well aren't you a carnival of tricks."
She pushes aside the staff. "I know I am. And, uh, don't do that again; that was my tits."
His ears fold back, muttering an apology.
The two of them continue onwards, with Wolf scouting ahead slightly. Ghost decides to fill the silence. "That is quite the nose he has."
Wolf mutters to him. "Yeah. If they're anything like their Earth counterparts, then their noses are probably killer. I'm not envious, though; imagine having to smell that much, all the time. Drive me insane."
"Well, he wasn't wrong; you do need a wash. It's been almost two weeks since you left Sol."
Two weeks? Already? It feels like she's barely scratched the surface of what's going on in this world, and half of her promised time to Ikora is already out the window. She needs to hurry up and find a way off this rock, but...
How? She can't exactly rush the mysteries out of this place, especially since she's stuck to being on foot. If she can find a way to unlock Ghost's permissions to use sparrows, then it'd make this way faster. But without having Ghost being able to fish out any signals, then the two of them are stuck with finding anything of significance that looks very much like it's from the Golden Age. To add up on that, they're missing two Ghosts, and from Ghosts muttered a grand total of once, they're probably on the move, too.
Awesome.
Pulling her out of her thoughts, however, is something that isn't more forest. Planting itself on the crossroads between the two northward directions is a large, covered wooden wagon. From the back, she can see horses - which adds to the list of familiar creatures she's seen - but not much else. As she moves her way off to the side to see the front, however, reveals an assortment of random items, listed with little signs that have small discriptions in Mandarin, English, and - this makes her do a double-take - Russian. Reading it off, there's various things from small pouches and rustic travel bags, to weird accessories that might have some sort of cultural significance she's unaware of, then she spots a few weapons like a spear, two swords of various conditions and make, and a few knives that look to be useful from cooking to skinning and carving. Leaning against the counter of the mobile shop is a waist high sign, painted with the Mandarin words 'Magpie's Marvelous Mobile Merchandise'.
Oh, and there's a fuzzy brown, white-tipped appendage swaying from behind the makeshift counter, a tune being hummed from out of sight. It takes Wolf a moment to realize it's a tail.
Not a wolf's tail, either.
"Now what are you?" Ghost seems to come to the same conclusion. "Are there more weird species to be aware of?"
"I... think that name was originally for English." She whispers, peering back at the sign.
Not even before she finishes speaking, she hears a gasp, the sound of something falling on a wooden floor followed by a curse in English, and a figure suddenly shoots up from behind the counter and slams their hands on the counter. "Is that a customer I-"
They stop, Wolf clamping her jaw shut as the not-wolf looks around the supposedly empty fork in the road. Looking at them, they appear to be covered in some light brown fur, with splotches of white on the ends of their extremities. They're dressed in a pair of dark brown overalls, with a strap that, despite the patches keeping it together, falls off their shoulder. They have a head that sort of reminds her of some kind of rabbit, what with the big ears splayed out to the side, but that doesn't really seem to fit. Off the top of her head, they don't seem to fit any animal, really. And for some reason, they have hair. Just like a human would, colored a sun-bleached blonde and pulled back in a rough ponytail.
Then her gaze returns to the chest area, noticing two somethings.
Ghost is the first to break their shared surprise. "Those are... very human-looking."
Wolf responds through the link. "Yeah. Like, wow. If that was a human behind the counter, I'd think they moonlight as a model for some risqué site on the 'Net." She shakes her head. "Wait a minute- yeah, she does look surprisingly human shaped, what the hell?"
If she pictures it in her head, the arms and torso are practically one to one in terms of shape. She never could get a good look at Klein, so the two of them were in the dark because of the loose robes he wears. To be fair, this isn't a 'wolf', so maybe they all look different?
She starts to feel a headache coming, quelling the urge to take a swig of ether until later.
The new creature eventually shrugs, then flips one ear up higher and gets all excited again. Soon, moving his way slowly from the northwest trail, Klein makes his appearance. He gives the wagon a strange look, and something in his face changes when he gets closer. He shifts directions from moving straight past it to roughly where she is standing in front of the shop. Wolf has to quietly move to the side to avoid having him bump into the cloaked Hunter.
The creature in the wagon is practically vibrating. "Klein! It's so good to see you! What're you doing way out here- I've never seen you leave your tree?"
Klein does the impossible and laughs. Like, an actual, happy laugh. "Oh, I've just going some business down in Llwynderw, and I felt like leaving a bit earlier than usual."
Magpie - Wolf is taking a guess, based on the sign - makes an exaggerated, really convincing sad look. "B-but you're one of my best suppliers! You have a great source of neat things to sell to people and I really want to sell them to people in need."
Klein freezes up, then glances behind him with a surveying look. After nodding, he looks back to the unknown creature. "Well, I don't know about knickknacks and the like, but..." He stops himself. "No, I shouldn't worry your little head over this."
Falling for the conversation and it's bait, she leans forward. "Ooo, you have to tell me. Please?" She claps her hands together in a classic begging pose, eyes and all.
"Oh, alright, just put down those there eyes, they're dangerous." Carefully going into a fold of his robes, he pulls out a bone-white object, which Wolf mistakes for a knife until Klein places it on the counter between him and Magpie. "Now this... is a Wyvern's fang."
Magpie's jaw drops. "Oh. My. Masks. Where on Mekkan did you find this? It looks fresh and everything!" She audibly sniffs. "Smells fresh, too. What happened?"
Klein shrugs. "I've the faintest idea, pup. Just saw it on my doorstep. It's not like I need it, anyhow."
While they're talking, Ghost's voice runs through her head, urgently. "I'm picking up on some movement. Two hits, eleven o'clock, human sized."
Almost as if she heard him, Magpie's huge ears suddenly rotate to her right, her worried look being replaced by another excited look. "Oh, is that more customers?!" She then crawls over the counter, half hanging off of it as she looks around the corner of her wagon. "Hello, you two, welcome to Magpie's Marvelous Mobile Merchandise! Come on over, I promise I don't bite!" She then swings back into the wagon, tail wagging fast enough to shake her body.
Curious, Wolf takes a peek around the corner to see the newcomers. Standing there, sharing a confused look between themselves, are two more wolves. Both are wearing matching black robes, both different shades of brown, both having... hair.
"Okay, what gives with the non-human having really good hair. I'm not sure about the thing behind the counter, but I know wolves aren't supposed to have it." Wolf shakes her head. "I need a drink. Or five."
"At least you can drink your headaches away, imagine being stuck in a body that can't feel drunk, ever." Ghost grumbles to her.
"Cheers, I'll drink to that, bud."
Unknowing of the invisibly overwhelmed, the two keidrans warily make their way forwards. As they pass her, she gets a better look at them. One of them is slightly taller than the other -although both of them at least break six feet - with the shorter one having longer hair than the other. The long-haired wolf has a bow and quiver, while the short-haired one has a sword strapped to their waist. Neither have them in their hands, but their clawed digits seem to be ready for some sort of confrontation.
Turning his head to examine them, Klein gives them a polite smile. "Sorry 'bout that, Maggie here tends to thing everyone on the road is..." He trails off, Wolf spotting his nose twitching. "Do I know you two from somewhere? Your scents are... familiar."
The taller one puts on an easy smile, striding forward and outpacing the shorter one. "Not that I know of. Have you been around Maes Mawr, you probably saw us around there when we were young?" They speaks with a tone like he's been told this many times before, or they're just that good at conversation.
The other one scoffs. "Probably smelled the fish that I packed. You know, for myself." After hearing the one with longer hair speak, the accent seems... familiar. The voice is odd, too, but she can't really place why.
Tall-wolf sighs contentedly. "And what a beautifully salted fish it was." He lets out a laugh when Short-wolf shoves him a bit. Turning his attention back to Klein, he shrugs. "Sorry about that, my little brother tends to get a little cranky when he doesn't get his fish."
The - apparently - younger brother makes an exaggerated roll of his eyes, deciding to ignore the conversation to instead take a look at the mobile shop. He does give Magpie a weird look, after giving the available items a once-over. "You're... a basitin, right? Thought your kind never left their island."
Wolf can't help but get a bit closer, probably more curious than the one who asked the question. Ghost whispers a slight warning that her grasp on their invisibility is starting strain, but she brushes it off to listen.
Magpie laughs it off, waving a hand at the younger wolf. "Oh, I've never been to the islands; was born and raised on the mainland. Been all over between here and Human territory traveling, and now I'm selling and traveling! Speaking of- Welcome, now buy something!" She almost shouts, starting to shake in excitement... again.
Wolf carefully leans against the wagon, tuning out Magpie as she tries to pull all three keidrans into looking through her wares. Looking over the merchandise again, she muses to Ghost. "So, an island full of mystery creatures with human-like qualities, on top of wolves with human-like qualities. Was there anything surrounding the Luvial Crux that'd-"
"No, there isn't. Didn't think Braytech was really into genetic engineering, either; at least, any facilities on Mars. There's a chance, but not something on a scale this big."
Wolf almost hums in disappointment, but stops herself. "And the ears on her aren't for show, either. Able to hear through noise-suppressing helmets at short distances? Now that is something I can be jealous of." She looks at the blue crystals, some of them glowing a noticeable blue, even in daylight. It bares a noticeable resemblance to Klein's staff topper.
She wonders if Klein would get angry with her if she steals some. Ghost did want to get a scan on some...
The older brother looks to everyone present, with a look that the younger brother catches. Ever so slightly, the older brother twitches his nose, with the younger brother shaking his head ever so slightly in return. Out loud, with that easy grin still in place, he says "So, I know this is going to sound weird, but..." He gestures to the old wolf. "Sorry, I forgot to get your name?"
"Klein."
"Hey, Klein, have you... smelled, anything out of the ordinary? On the road, I mean."
Klein takes a moment to think about it. "...no. I had a wyvern fang come into my possesion, recently, but it didn't smell off to me. Why do you ask, pup?"
His face takes on a slightly more grim look. "My brother and I have been tracking a dangerous mark. Supposedly, they went through the ruins of Bitharm from the north and were headed down this road."
Wolf tenses. "Ghost?"
His response is quick. "Theoretically speaking, we could have crashed near a settlement. The minature forest fire and more obvious tracks at the start probably gave anyone with tracking training a good enough lead. It was a big crater you made."
Looking back at Klein, he sees the surprise flash over his face. They haven't known each other for long...
She needs to think of something, quick. As she takes stock of the situation, her eyes land on the glowing blue rocks next to her.
"...Ghost."
"Wolf?"
"Did we pack any street casuals?"
"...I'm sorry, what?"
"He knows something."
"That one's obvious, Zen. What exactly he knows, is what we need to know."
Said information is where the hell is that human he's hiding. This trip is... really something. Probably the worst part was seeing the trail head straight to his and Zen's childhood home. Destroyed childhood home, to be specific.
Great memories, really.
After that, and a pace that's honestly really fast for a human out of their element, they found out that they're suddenly catching up when they found the road. It threw them for a loop, really, because the rain might've threw them off of the human's scent, but it's as if they just... stopped. Then kept going after the rain stopped, making far worse time than in the forests further north.
Seeing the old wolf in front of them makes the story of this mystery human make less and less sense. Natani got a quick rundown of who Klein was - who also came from Bitharm, so now he has to cover up for someone who might know his secret - and he hates humans about as much as any other old wolf does. So why is his scent traveling at the same pace as the human's scent trail?
Not only that, but the scent of human blood is fresher than it should've been, the campsites taken every night were showing them taking it in the same vicinity of each other, then there's a few times where they seemed to stop early. That... last one might be because of the old wolf- but still!
And to top it off, the trail just suddenly disappeared not to far back, as if the human never existed in the first place. The only way that could have been done was through magic, which matches up with what they know, so far. That... battlefield was something else, and he was hoping they could get the drop on the human. It's not like anyone would be against some human dropping dead in human territory, anyhow.
Zen groans internally. "He seems stubborn, which is really like him to be like this."
"We knew him?"
"Yeah, he snitched on you wearing more boyish clothing to father, when we were cubs."
"Then we should back off, try to pick them off at a distance. Should be easy enough to keep the old dog pinned while we deal with the human."
"Won't work; he knows how to use magic, and how to use it pretty well for ditry magic. I'd rather chance another instance where a desperate old wolf uses black magic."
Oh. Yeah, no, he doesn't want to deal with that again. "How about we try reasoning with him? Maybe if we just ask, he'll just bring us to-"
"So how much is this?" Asks a bored, feminine voice.
At first, he forgot the basitin was with them, who she was keeping occupied by browsing and asking questions every now and again. This, however, is a voice coming from right next to him and sounds nowhere peppy enough from the wierd - and sort of cute(?) - woman in front of him. Turning, he almost pulls a knife from how close they are.
Standing next to him and holding a small mana crystal in an open hand, is the human. What throws him off is that, not only are they surprisingly shorter than him, but they were tracking a woman this whole time. They have medium-length brown hair, skin that is a very pale white, and red eyes giving a bored but curious look towards the basitin. The clothes she is wearing is odd - probably some sort of human design - with a sort of thick shirt that covers their arms and has a hood pulled off. It looks like it's made from three seperate other shirts: one sleeve is brown, the top is green, and the rest is black. Her pants are also brown, with a lot of pockets stitched very well onto them, and a pair of brown boots that seem well-kept and well-used top off the look.
At the ensuing silence, the human seems to notice it and looks at Natani as if she only just noticed him. She blinks at his staring. "Uh, can I help you?"
Natani has to work his jaw to say something, even then all he gets out is "You..."
She raises a brow. "Are you okay? I know I didn't sneak up on you guys, I've been standing here for at least two minutes."
Natani leans away a bit. "What- no, you weren't!"
The human leans away some, too. "I... was? Like, I heard you guys talking to Klein," She points at the old wolf. "About some dangerous human lurking about? Something we should be worried about?"
"You heard all of-" His mind catches up to the rest of her questions. "Wait, you're the human we've been tracking?"
"You two were stalking me?" Her brow raises a bit further.
"You were stalking a woman?" The basitin behind the counter gets a very concerned look.
"Wha- no, I-" He can't help but stammer, with how much the conversation went in such a different direction. He looks at Zen, a pleading look on his face. "Don't just stand there, say something!"
Zen, the talker that he is, keeps his easy smile up. "To be fair, we were told that you'd be dangerous. Whether or not that's true is something we needed to find out." He looks her up and down. "Although, I think that's becoming less and less true as time goes on."
The human switches her look to Zen. "I mean, I could be dangerous? But it's not like I'm a maniac, running around and stabbing random people. I helped Klein out with a wyvern, when it attacked his tree-"
"The Tree of Bitharm, woman."
"-that's what I said, but that's the most stabbing I've done."
...what. A wyvern? Don't they nest in mountains? This human is so full of herself!
Natani laughs. "Nice try, but you know that we don't have any wyverns in our forests, right? Besides, you can't be that good in a fight."
The human just purses her lips. "Are you sure about that?"
Zen sends over a hum of appreciation, through their link. "Well, I admire her tenacity and bluffs. Makes me a bit jealous of that bravado."
Natani sighs audibly. "I know, but we still need to find out if she has that rock, still." Out loud, he says, "Look, we're just curious if you're going to be a danger to us, and if you plan on leaving this territory sooner or later. Humans don't belong-"
Almost as if she teleported, her finger is right up against his muzzle, silencing his words. "Hold that thought. Hey, your name's Magpie, right?" She turns her attention to the basitin behind the counter, who has been shooting worried looks towards Klein this whole time.
At her name being called, she looks at her. "Oh- yup, that's my name!"
"Do you do trade? I don't have any local currency to work with."
Somehow, she finds the energy to laugh. "Oh, that won't be a problem, miss! I tend to travel through human territory, too, so that sorta coinage works just fine."
The human sucks in air through her teeth, making a hissing sound. "Yeah, about that... I mean I have very foreign currency. I sailed in from out west, place called Sol."
That threw Natani for a loop. Is... there land out west? He's never heard of a place going out that far, before. Yet again, he's never really had a reason to ask, before.
Then the thought that this human they've been following isn't from Mekkan hit him, and he looks at her with a disbelieving look. "So you're not from Mekkan, then?"
She gives him an annoyed look. "Can't you see I'm bargaining, here?" She looks back to Magpie. "If you are willing to trade, I just picked up something that might be right up your alley."
"Oh, is it something marvelous?" Magpie practically purrs the last word.
All the human does is hold her hand out, palm facing the counter. Then, in a sudden flash of blue light about as big as his torso, Natani watches as an entire wyvern head suddenly appears from nothing. Through the shock of witnessing this, he notices that it looks a bit saggy, the scent confirming that it's been dead for a few days. Another thing, which is odd, is that the stump of it's neck is cauterized. It's almost as if whatever killed it had done so with a blade fresh from a forge.
Natani stares.
"Natani."
"Yeah, Zen?"
"We are in so far over our heads, aren't we?"
Natani doesn't respond, mostly because his posture basically says that he agrees with his brother.
While his thoughts run through with what to do, the human and the basitin negotiate a price for the head - in which the human clearly stated that she doesn't mind being undercharged. A small part of Natani who's always had to fight fang and claw for barely enough wants to slap her for saying that - which mostly ended up with the human getting tade items instead of coin. One of which is cleaning Magpie out of her mana crystals, which just hurts him even more. It's not like she can use them, anyhow.
Zen then puts a hand on his shoulder. "You know what? I feel like we understand now that you aren't a problem, right..." He waves his hand in the human's direction, asking for a name silently.
"Wolf." She answers plainly, turning around to watch the two of them.
Zen blinks. "Yes?"
She shakes her head. "No, I mean my name is Wolf."
"Wha- what kind of name is that?" For once, his facade of being a smooth talker slips.
She shrugs. "One that's about as good as any other. I mean, she's named after a bird, but you didn't say anything." She nods her head to the basitin, who is still marveling over the wyvern head.
Zen tries his best to slip back on the mask of 'friendly traveler'. "R-right. Well, in any case, we're sorry for bothering you. We'll just be going, now."
Before they could take more than three steps, the human calls out, again. "Hey, wait." He can hear her walk up to them.
When Natani turns around, despite Zen telling him not to, he sees her holding a bag in one hand, which is what coinage she earned from giving away that head. "What, we're leaving now, and we don't want any-"
The human tosses the bag at him, and on instinct he holds up a hand and catches it. Whatever he was thinking she was going to do, he certainly wasn't thinking this. He looks down at it, then back up. "Uh..."
Wow. If he was any smoother, he'd be tree bark.
For the first time upon seeing her, she smirks. "Yeah, I knew you two were trying to take my stuff. Only reason I didn't fight was because I was curious about you two."
...oh. Natani feels a bit lightheaded, at that.
She continues. "That, and- well, I'm looking for something. And I was hoping for a couple of locals who knew the area to help me out. So, uh..." She points at the bag. "There's more of that, if you're curious. Now if you excuse me, I think Klein might be heading back to his tree: I think this was his actual stop and he might abandon me to the wilds." With the offer placed before the brothers, she turns on her heel and walks back to the wagon, throwing her hands up in the air and beginning an argument with the old wolf.
...
He looks at Zen.
Zen looks at him.
Both of them look down at the coin purse.
Zen says first, "There's no way we're doing this. She just played us, hard, and we couldn't do a thing about it. We might as well leave, come on." He gives the human another look, then starts walking away.
Natani... doesn't say anything, nor moves to follow.
Curious. That's what's sticking to him the most, more than the questionable promise of more payment to go along with all of this. Sure, the reason they followed after her was because it was a chance to have a good winter, for once, but now? They still don't know about whether or not she has the rock or not. But they're still getting paid enough to get through everything, by someone who can singlehandedly kill a wyvern with some unknown level of magic.
Most of all, Natani wants to know why they seem... familiar. Something in the back of his mind is telling him that her face is...
Zen finally reaches him, after doubling back for him. "Natani?"
He looks over to the human, just in time to see her getting hit in the head and scolded by the older wolf, Magipe giggling all the while. "Well, she did get one thing right."
"What?" His brother's eyes widen. "Oh, no, we aren't."
"Well..." He shrugs. "What's the worst that could happen? Maybe she'll pay us in that sky rock. She doesn't look like she knows value that well, we could probably negotiate that being our payment, and get out of giving her a tour being rich enough to get in a good place." He looks back at Zen. "Maybe we wouldn't have to be assassins, anymore? Live out the rest of our lives comfortably, you could find a nice woman to woo, I could be the cool uncle that's way better looking than you-"
Zen pushes his face out of the way, rolling his eyes. "Okay, now I know you're talking nonsense. Me, having minature me's running around? There's only room for one in this world. Besides, it's not like she's that rich; I mean, look at what she's wearing? Think a rich human would wear something like that?"
"...I mean, it is well made. Could be rich human clothes. You ever seen a rich human, before?"
"Yes. We went to a masquerade with a bunch of humans, and all the women wore frilly dresses." He shakes his head. "Well, at the very least, we have something on us to get us through the winter, easily enough- speaking of," He reaches over and swipes it from Natani. "This is going into the communal fund of the Magi Brothers continued existence." He tucks it away.
Natani rolls his eyes again. He's been doing that a lot, recently. "Greedy guts. Come on, let's see what this deal's about."
Walking back over, they interrupt Wolf - if that's her real name, anyhow - in the middle of making a loud clapping sound, Magpie enraptured by her words. "-then next thing I knew, I was in it's jaws. The armor took most of it, but the shaking right afterwards hurt like a-" She stops, taking a look at her audience. "Uh, before I make this mistake later, is 'bitch' one of those words I shouldn't say, or..."
Natani tilts his head. "Why wouldn't you say it?"
"It's one of my favorite words to curse with. Was gonna say 'it hurt like a bitch', but I didn't want to offend an entire species."
Zen somehow holds back a strangled laugh, taking another step closer. "W-what does that mean? You trying to say the wyvern hits like a girl, or something?"
Whatever lax stance the human had, it suddenly tenses as she makes hard eye contact with Zen. Slowly, she raises a brow. "Can you repeat that for me?"
Natani wisely takes one step away from Zen.
His brother, meanwhile, falls for the trap. "I'm saying that you just said that the giant lizard fought like some 'fair maiden', or whatever-"
Quick as lightning, Wolf goes from leaning against the counter to having a fist buried into Zen's gut, and the hit was so hard that it lifted him up a good foot into the air. Almost in direct opposition of her strike, she just lazily pulls her fist back and watches Zen fall to the ground, coughing. Wolf then squats down to his level, a lopsided grin on her face. "Hey."
Somehow, through the pain that Natani can feel through the link, Zen looks up at her and mouths 'what?'
"You know what that punch hurt like?" She then looks up at him, another smug look on her face. "A bitch."
...oh no.
What did they just agree, to?
While the older brother is recovering from the swift vocabulary lesson, Wolf dust off her hands and looks over to the younger brother. "So, you two are just going to run off, or whatever? If you are, I'll be fine: turns out that Magpie here is also heading for Llwer- for Llwyndy... the town down south. That."
Magpie chooses then to speak up from somewhere within her wagon. "Oh, this is going to be so much fun! I've never hand any traveling companions, before. I'm usually super lonely."
After no further elaboration on that last sentence, the younger brother mutters "Okay..." Before facing back to her. "And no, we wanted to take you up on your offer. We've been to there, before, so it shouldn't be too hard to find what you're looking for. If we head out soon, we can be there tomorrow before sundown."
Wolf hears Ghost hum. "Well. They stayed, and didn't run off with your 'gold', now what?"
'Now what', indeed. Wolf sort of expected them to run with their tails tucked betw... to run for the hills, once they saw all the evidence pointing towards how unbelievably dangerous she was, but maybe she underestimated their stubbornness? So far, every keidran she met has some sort of stubborn attitude sprinkled in with their personality, but that number can be counted on one hand.
She gives the younger brother another once-over, and only seeming to notice now his eyes. One is a plain brown, while the other is an eye-catching silver. Something about it is... off. She almost expects some kind of scar running through it, as if it was wounded at some point, but she can't place why she thinks that.
The hunter speaks to her Ghost. "At least we're not flying blind into the first inhabited town on this rock. Just hoping that they don't stab me in my sleep, or something."
Ghost chuckles. "It would be hilarious to see what they look like when you get rezzed. Not every day an assassin kills someone and their mark just shrugs it off, eh?"
"Mhm." A beat passes. "Wait, you're an assassin?" She furrows her brow.
Natani freezes, and suddenly the tail that's usually under their robes suddenly stiffens out in what might be surprise. "Where did you hear that?" His voice is definitely nervous, going up an octave too.
"I, uh, might have been listening in on your conversation and that tidbit finally registered." When that does nothing to help her current situation, she keeps talking. "I mean, I won't judge, times can be hard and what-not, you gotta do whatcha gotta do and stuff. Probably nowhere as bad as what I did, anyways."
If anything, that makes him more concerned. "What do you mean, 'what you did?'"
Now it's her turn to panic. "Nothing! Nothing at all! Just been walking around trying to... yeah!" She tries to lean against the wagon to help keep her cool, but the store sign she leans against suddenly planks, the top part hitting the counter and the bottom half talking out one of her legs. Not expecting it, she falls to the ground face-first.
Ghost, being the helpful little pal that he is, laughs at Wolf in her mind.
The older brother, who finally caught his breath, starts to laugh, but devolves into a coughing fit, holding his gut. The younger one, however, looks like they want to laugh, but they're sandwiched between that and continuing to panic.
Klein, who already started to leave, cackles like the old bastard that he is.
Magpie peeks her head out at the commotion. "What's going on? Sorry, I was-" She looks down at the mess of people in front of her. "Um, do you want some help?"
Wolf groans into the dirt. "No, just..." She waves an arm at her. "Give me a minute." She lets the arm fall back to the ground, hoping nobody at least saw her embarrassed face.
After giving herself exactly one minute - Ghost counted for her - she stands herself up, going to fix the sign before watching Magpie take it into the wagon-shop first. After dusting herself off, she looks up at... "Right, I don't know your names."
The one with the longer hair looks down at her. Both of them are tall, for a human comparison, but they aren't tall. A Devil Captain can easily tower over everyone here, much less Shaxx, himself. "Natani. The idiot on the floor is Zen."
"Hey." The now named 'Zen' finally finds the strength to stand up. Wolf thinks it's mostly theatrics: she felt the muscle under those robes, so he isn't a pushover. "That was a good punch, by the way."
She shrugs. "It was kinda eh, to be honest. I didn't want to rupture any organs, or something."
Or disintegrate him in a blast of Arc lightning. She's no Arcstrider, but that rush she had when she got her Light back had made punching... satisfying. Like an itch she never knew needed scratching.
In either case, he just laughs it off. "Right, right. So, my delightful little brother here was begging me-"
"Was not."
"-to come along with you. That, and the promise of extra payment is convincing, too."
The Hunter remembers why she talked to Natani, earlier. "Oh, right- so you know that bag I gave you two? Can I have that back, please?"
The brothers share a glance. "Why?"
"Did you look inside of it?"
They share another look - it's almost hilarious, the expression on their canid faces - as Zen unshoulders his pack, takes out the small pouch inside, then opens the pouch and reaches in-
-to pull out a dull green coin, with the image of a serpent on both sides.
The shocked look on both of their faces did put a smile on her face, however.
Natani stutters out some nonsense, taking a second to say anything sensible. "Wha- but I was- how-" He does a dry swallow, trying to collect himself. "You just played us. Twice."
Wolf shrugs, putting her hand behind her back while Ghost transmats the real coin pouch. "Well, maybe you shouldn't have tried to jack my shit. Now come here, I need those back and I'll give you usable currency, deal?"
Oh, Wolf is going to have fun on this planet. The thought of staying here a bit long than expected isn't so sharp, anymore.
So remember when I said I was going to make these shorter, to be better on myself? Me neither.
Thanks to everyone who threw follows and faves my way, even when I don't post anything quick or consistent. Especially the reviews, even if all it says is showing some love. It means something, really.
A note for those who don't know what TwoKinds is, because someone asked: It's a free webcomic made by Tom Fischbach, which he started in the early 2000's. The earlier pages definitely show their age, but if you want to know how good the art will be, just take a peek at the most recent pages or at Tom's sketches: I personally like the style. As for the genre, it might not be your cup of tea if you read this for the Destiny content being a Adventure/Drama/Romance-ish, but the adventure and character interactions is what kept me there.
Even if the art is a bit risque for most (which isn't saying much, seeing the kind of names people have in Destiny 2). It almost turned me away, but I stayed for the plot lines introduced at the more recent chapters. It's not for those who don't care for seeing 'the hot bods' at pg-13.
And the world it takes place in is what interests me, with a lot of things I mention not (yet) explicitly stated in the comic. A lot of things are just side characters that either Tom never got a chance to show off because the story turned them away from their current location, or it didn't really fit the story for them to exist.
I have no such limitations, however. Insert evil cackle here.
And for my recommendation while I write up the next chapter: For all you Pokemon fans out there, we got 'Borne of Caution' by Fuggmann. It's a fresh take on the whole "Person from Earth goes to Pokemon world", but with the intrigue of them having experience working with animals professionally. It's not an exact 1:1 with how zoology and the science behind it works, but it's enough to make the average reader enthralled.
I would know, I'm an average reader and I'm enthralled. Hope you'll like it, too.