Wolf Might've Made Some Mistakes, Which Was Bound To Happen Let's Be Honest Here
Wolf might've made a mistake.
Which... well, is honestly par for the course with the Hunter, really. A lot of things come to mind that was a result of her making a mistake: not being fast enough, back in the Prison of Elders; not seeing how much of a fool herself - and her whole raid team, for that matter, especially the other fireteam they brought along; they lost one of their members for Traveler's sake - became for falling for the Witch's tricks; not shooting Gary in his bitch face when she had the chance...
Except for that last one; if she did, then the Almighty would've shot the sun, which was a big no-no. Cayde was an awful influence on her.
So, now what was the point she was making to herself? Right. The fact that she connected the dots that a): the suppression effect works on mana, apparently, so that's a nice thing to know, and b): whatever in the fresh hell she did made the wolf not under suppression fall down?
"What the fuck?" She breathes out.
"Natani!" Zen shouts, shoving her aside.
As she stumbles away from the last wolf standing, Magpie stands up and starts backing away warily. Her stance is that of someone who's ready to run at a moments notice, ears at attention and facing everyone in front of her. Honestly, she doesn't blame her; she thought the basitin as a civilian, anyhow. The last thing civies want is a nasty fight with someone - or someones - that you know can kill. Speaking of killing, Zen looks like he's a hair's width away from either running over to Natani or turning on her and stabbing her.
She feels the weight of a one-handed gun transmat into the back part of her waistband, the cool metal pressing into the small of her back. She's... probably not going to use it. Hopefully not. Slowly, she raises her hands in what she hopes to be a pacifying gesture, hands splayed out and empty. "So... whatever just happened wasn't my intention, okay buddy?"
Zen then fully zeros in on her and- oh, great, she made it worse. He goes and snarls at her, his face turning from soft, friendly wolf to worryingly sharp and full of fangs wolf. "You-"
And that's all he gets out before he stops, eyes flickering behind her for a moment-
-"Movement on your six."-
-and a new voice makes itself known. "Well this is interesting."
She almost gives herself whiplash from turning so fast, because the words she heard were- they were speaking English. Someone who wasn't her and Ghost, all the way out here, literal lightyears away from Earth, is speaking yet another Earthborne language!
Standing not too far from her is... a human. Somewhere around her height, he leans against a tree not far from her with a pleasently surprised smile. We wears road-worn traveling clothes armored with leather - which looks freshly oiled, adding a contrasting style in a way - and, yet again, there is a sword at his side. Still in its sheath, it appears to be a plain shortsword, meant for speed and ease of handling, more than anything. There's a five-o-clock shadow covering a tanned jaw, crooked with said smile and causing dark brown eyes to crinkle slightly, or eye, his black hair slicked over one of them. He looks just as he said: pleasantly surprised.
"A human?" Both herself and Zen say, herself switching to English. She continues. "Huh. Guess I was wrong."
He keeps the grin up, not moving from his spot. "Wrong about what, sweetheart?"
"...o-kay, not sure how I feel about this guy. You, Ghost?"
It doesn't take him but a moment to respond. "I wouldn't. Why would there be a human using a steel sword in territory that only has wolves?"
The answer comes to her as she gives a pout to the human. "Well, I was hoping that the humans around here were just a coincidently named species or... something." She rolls a wrist, making it seem like she's about so say more before shrugging.
His grin slides off his face for a moment as he digests her words, then it goes right back in place. "I have no idea what you mean, lady, but let's say its not often you see a human making merry with a bunch of animals."
She snorts. "Wow, you must live a sad life."
His mask cracks again. He keeps it up - surprisingly - but his tone gets more dangerous. "What?"
"You telling me you never had a pet you loved? Like, a small cat or something that sits on you and forces you to stay there for the next hour? Soft little thing that makes you squeal a little whenever it rolls over?"
"I'm not talking about that you bi-"
"None at all? Yeesh, no wonder you act the way you are. You're like a sad little dog who wasn't loved enough as a puppy." She nods to herself, switching to Mandarin. "Yes, a sad puppy. Fits so well."
Zen, who switched from being livid at her to 'I'm ready to stab whichever human makes the wrong move', makes a noise somewhere between a whimper and a cackle. She takes a glance behind her to flash him a wink, which serves to confuse him further. Good, confused is good. She can work with confused.
She looks back at the sad puppy. "But yeah, I was..." She shoots a look back at the wolf on the ground- which Natani decided was a good time to let out a long, suffering groan. Putting a hand to his head, he shuffles his way into a kneeling position and looks up in their direction, head tiliting at the newcomer.
"A human?"
Wolf shrugs. "That's what I said."
Zen pivots, robes taking their sweet time readjusting to his new position. "Natani, you're okay!"
Magpie, who she forgot about for a couple of minutes, just looks lost.
The new human in the thicket finally loses his smile. "Oh great, the other one woke up. This will make things a bit more difficult."
Wolf just raises a brow. "Make what more diffic-"
Something stops her jaw from moving down. A cold, sharp pain blossoms on the bottom of her chin. She freezes.
"What the- six more just showed up from nowhere!" Ghost informs her.
Out of the corner of her eye, she sees another leather-armored person, this one wearing a hood that casts a shadow over their face. She can't tell much from that one, but the one behind Zen is definitely human; holding a knife to his throat is a distinctly female human. The campfire shows a wicked grin on her face as the knife- no, dagger presses closer to his neck. Even then, she notices a second form being blocked by Zen's body, holding an arm back and prying something out of his hand. If the slight sounds of panic behind her mean anything, then the other two are in a similar situation.
Not good. Civilian in trouble. Her guides are discombobulated from her supression. She's only armed with a handful of knives and a gun that her captor hasn't noticed, yet. And... and they're human.
Even if they're being awful, she can't kill them.
The man laughs, clapping his hands. "Oh, wonderful job, everyone! They didn't even hear you coming, not even the long-eared freak over there."
Wolf hears her whimper. She hates that noise. She needs to fix this, and fix it yesterday.
...she can still talk.
"...so, yeah, I walk right into that one." She almost wants to shrug, but the knife keeps her still. "Nice setup, by the way. Might use that whole bait-and-switch tactic when I get home."
The man, who looks a lot smugger than before, gives her a grin. "Oh? Changing your tune so soon? Where were all those insults you were slinging, earlier?"
She scoffs. "Insults? There were genuine observations. I mean, there's gotta be one person here that knows how right I was. Right?" She dares a glance behind her, and...
...nothing. Hm.
"O-kay, tough crowd, tough crowd..." She sucks in some air through her teeth. "Well, I'm going to take a guess that you're... I'm not going to say smugglers, that's a rude word- businessmen! You're a man of dealing out goods and getting glim- coin, am I right?"
For some reason, he humors her. "In a sense." His smile somehow becomes greasier.
"Cool, awesome, so then I'm going to take a guess- you don't have so say that I'm right or wrong, leave it all ambiguous, but this place has to be important to you: either an important route or site for some reason, whatever, it's important. I... deeply apologize for the intrusion and so do my traveling companions, if we have to pay a toll or recompense for trespassing I'm all for it."
His expression shifts, mulling over her words for a second before- "No."
She blinks. "...what- what do you mean 'no'?"
Puppy-man makes slow, almost skipping strides over to her, making a show of pulling something out of a large pouch from behind him. It's... a metal loop? Or a large cuff of some kind, she can barely see a seam in the metal as he swings it around with one finger. "I mean, the fact that I'm doing this is part of my business. Now, I know that this one isn't as fancy as what the others will be getting," He unclasps it and- oh, it's a collar, because he leans forward and puts it around her neck. "But something tells me you'll get used to it, sooner or later."
...and now she has to add 'enslavement of their own kind' to the things these humans have been doing. Great.
She starts being shoved towards the fire, the other three complying in various ways. Natani is confused and a bit pissed off - but his two captors are keeping him in check - Zen is about ten seconds away from ignoring the blade at his throat and just biting the woman's face off, and... oh, poor Magpie- she looks terrified; shivering and being uncharacteristically quiet, with tears starting to flood her eyes.
She shoots a raised brow at the man, however. Something about what he said... "Oi, what's different about theirs?"
"Oh, these little things?" He holds up another metal collar, this one with... are those runes? "The usual fair when it comes to these animals: subjugation collars are a bit pricey but oh, so worth it." He lifts the collar up and, looking between the three non-humans, finally landing on Magpie.
Said basitin shivers even harder.
Ghost whispers to her. "Those collars are giving off mana resonance."
She gets an idea.
"Oh, so you're just sexist, then."
The out of the blue statement is enough to make him stop. He turns to her, genuine surprise on his face. "What?"
Even the woman helping hold Zen hostage gives her a look.
She nods, the dagger at her neck cutting in slightly further. "Yeah. I mean, it took me a second because it's practically non-existent back home thanks to the Golden Age, but don't think I didn't notice."
"Ghost," She thinks to him. "I need help on a judgement call, here."
"What is it?"
For the first time, one of the other speak up- one holding Natani. "The hell is a Golden Age?"
"It's a long story." She answers offhandedly. "But, the important bit is how you organized your people. If everyone can take notice how many are next to what person- sorry, you're slavers, what appropriated property you're next to; what sticks out to you?"
"I can definitely get us out of here in five seconds, but... I don't want to kill any of them."
"...I understand. You really never had to do this, before. Saw plenty of it, back in the Dark Ages."
Slowly, she can see a few of them look between themselves. Oh, yes; if there's one thing she picked up from her late Vanguard, it's how to stir the pot. She could do this without speaking a single word, back in the day, and being able to talk just made it better. Or, uh, worse, depending on who asks.
A deep baritone from behind her, which surprises her, is the first to answer. "She's stalling."
She can feel the sweat start to form on her forehead.
Then woman talks next. "Actually... she has a point, Targen."
The slick with the collars - Targen - turns to the woman. "Wait- what?" He wheezes out.
"I need to know how far I can go, Ghost. I don't want to cross that line."
"I know. But from what I can tell, these people are the kind that ruin others. You remember that village we walked through?"
"...yes."
She continues, that same creepy grin on her face. "Yeah, you always double up on what you consider to be 'the tough ones', but from what I remember it's always the frail ones, the young ones, and the women."
"Huh." The one holding Magpie looks down at her. "You make a good point, Calliope. Wait, aren't basitins supposed to be all militant, or whatever? Why isn't this one getting two?"
'Calliope' keeps Wolf's ball rolling. "And we saw the animal fucker over there kicking their ass in tossing knives, she's probably better than these wolves in a fight."
"Thank you for the compliment." Wolf smiles.
"Shut up." She says without skipping a beat.
"So, with that being said, I would say that maiming is still on the menu."
"Non-lethal. Got it. Thank you, buddy."
"Anytime."
"So," Calliope says at length, taking her knife away from Zen's throat, another one taking its place. "Farkas here can keep this one in place, and how about I do the collaring for once? It's about time I get a taste of it."
"What- but- what am I supposed to do?" Targen says, looking between his cohorts and seeing them all stare at him expectantly.
Calliope casually walks up to him, rips the collars from him, then palms him the dagger she had. "You, can keep an eye on fur-lover over there. Even if she's been compliant so far, she needs the extra captor. More dangerous, and all that."
The woman laughs as the slick-haired man takes the blade with gritted teeth, walking up to her as the woman looks over the collars. He shoots Wolf a withering glare that almost makes her cackle with glee. "Anything else you want to say to ruin my evening? You're only making it harder on yourself."
"Hey. Love ya."
She feels a pleasant warmth. "Love you, too."
She looks over to Zen, who is one captor down, and bites her lip.
His eyes widen slightly, and both himself and Natani tense ever so slightly.
She shoots a glance at Magpie and back to Zen, and he answers with a wink. Good, that's taken care of.
She dares the smallest of shrugs, being rewarded with the knife drawing a bit closer into her neck. Oo, dangerous, she's so scared. "Well, even if you used it against me, I liked the execution on that invisibility. Mind if I borrow it?"
He sees his brow furrow. "What do you mean- you're being sold off you absolute-"
With a flick of her wrist, she tosses a ball of Voidsmoke at the campfire in the center of everyone. Everyone sees this happen, eyes dragging through the air as the purple-back bomb makes contact with the flames. As soon as everyone peels their eyes off her, she uses her free hand to go for the gun at her back and feel what it is. Sidearm. Lightweight. Possibly low-caliber and, hopefully, not going to nick any arteries.
The clearing is plunged into darkness, right as a loud bang punctuates her captor's kneecap getting a new hole in it- one down. Every slavers world is darkness and suffocating, and through the Void she can see it all: as her ex-captor falls to the ground, everyone else is having a coughing fit, as if the air itself was robbed from their lungs. She tries her best to keep it away from her traveling companions, but exerting this much control over the Void after using so much of it earlier is only going to give her a few seconds at best.
Unless... no, she won't kill any humans. She won't.
Best make those seconds count.
Using the hand not occupied by her sidearm - which she distantly notices to be a Spoiler Alert model - she grabs the knife dropped by the gruff man and throws herself into the smoke in a diving roll. As she rolls by Targen she buries the knife deep into his knee, hoping that will slow him down further. When he does the best thing for her and fall over - two down - she can see the silhouette of Zen and the slaver holding him hostage have a very short tussle, ending with a knife to his ribs.
She grimaces - three down - but that was Zen's choice. Assassin, and all that.
She swings the sidearm in front of her, lining up another shot at Calliope and taking her left kneecap with another gunshot. The woman screams, then the smoke must've been too much for her as she falls over and- oh, yup, that's her dinner. That's gross.
-four down-
Moving as quickly as she can without making a sound, her enhanced vision wavers as she moves up to Natani, who somehow managed to drive a dagger she hasn't seen yet into the neck of a gurgling slaver - five down - but got tackled over by the second one, choking but raising his knife over his head and about to drive it down-
-before her boot slams into the side of his hooded head - six down - throwing him and the knife aside. She doesn't feel sorry for the crack she hears. Without breaking her momentum she grabs Natani's arm and pulls him with her, the wolf having a hard time going from almost stabbed to dead to running for his life.
Right around then, her smoke begins to dissipate to the point of only leaving a strange smell in the air, and with the last bit of her vision left she sees Zen run his sword through the chest of Magpie's slaver - seven down - a splattering of grayscale fluid flying from their back. She gauges where the wagon is, then bolts in that direction as darkness comes to fill her sight. If there was any light coming from the moon, then it's taking its sweet time to filter through the canopy.
When she feels like they're close enough to the mobile shop, she shoves Natani forward. "Help get the wagon going, I'll hold them off."
She doesn't get a response, other than him shifting directions slightly. She can hear the horses panicking - probably from her sidearm, whoops - but she can distantly hear Magpie feverishly try to calm them down. A series of buckling follows, along with some spoken words between them. She pivots and plants herself into a crouch, sidearm held up and the SAS holosight lighting up and ready for her to shoot any slaver's legs.
It's not long before she sees the whole clearing light up, as if someone lit a signal flare. Back at the abandoned campsite, she sees the last four in various states of disarray, with Targen of all people holding... no, his hand is held up as if he's holding something, but a bring light just appeared above it as if-
-as if it was magic. Oh joy, he's a wizard or something.
Just to rub in the sudden shift in power, she lowers the sidearm slightly and gives the remaining four a large grin. "Looking for something, psesiskars?"
Targen zeros in on her, teeth gritted hard. "You."
Her grin gets bigger. "Me."
He stumbles forward, almost falling over again but managing to catch himself, and raises his other hand to suddenly make a ball of fire-
She shoots the fire-making hand, and it sputters out pitifully, just like his groan of pain. She shakes her head. "As much as I enjoy the magic show, my companions and I have a schedule to keep. And it'll be hard to keep it with all these distractions, you know?"
She stands up and crouches slightly, then jumps straight up. Feeling for her Light, she kicks off the air slightly in front of her and lands perfectly upright on the wagon. "But that hardly matters, where are my manners. So ya'll have two options here: you can either make a futile effort and try to come after us with holes in your legs - which I will make more, by the by - or," She shrugs. "You can, like, fuck off. We ganked almost half your crew in ten seconds, and it's my mercy that's keeping you alive. Do the math, I know you're not that stupid."
She feels the wagon lurch forwards, and as they gain speed she waves them off. One of them tries for another spell of some kind, but the stoic slaver that was holding Wolf at knifepoint grabs their arm and roughly pulls them, interrupting it. She can barely see a shake of his head, with the other angrily pull their arm back and pressing a hand on their leg. Calliope is still trying to figure out how to not vomit and breathe at the same time, and Targen is having an absolute fit with his hand.
She inhales deeply, then slowly lets out the breath. Turning around, she carefully makes her way across the moving shop, and with what little light that is provided she can see the front seat. Magpie is at the reigns, looking terrified still, and Natani's head is peeking out of a window of sorts from inside. Kneeling down, she knocks above the wolf's head.
While Magpie jumps and shoots her a glance, Natani just rotates around until he can see her. He blinks. "Hey."
She gives them a two-finger salute. "Howdy." She gives Magpie a wary look. "Need more light to drive?"
Still littered with the jitters, she gives her a confused look. "Um, y-yeah? Don't know how you can help with t-that unless you can-" She stops, then quickly waves a hand upwards. "Sun. Whatever." She lets out a nervous laugh that suspiciously sounds like a sob.
Both wolf and Wolf look at each other. Gently, she crawls down onto the seat next to her, making sure to let Natani have enough room. Holding her hand out of sight, Ghost appears long enough to give her a high-power torch, the cylindrical object being palmed easily. Another bit of transmat has her peek at her side, revealing a clamp, then one last flash leaves her with the two items minus Ghost. Seeing what he's suggesting, she turns back to the other two. "Hey, look."
Both look at her, then at the torch. Without saying anything, she points it up and flicks it on, bathing a fairly sizeable amount of canopy in light. She even spots an owl-like bird have its eyes flicker in the bright light. Leaning back over, she places it on one of the rails next to the seat, then screws the clamp around both the torch and the railing, with the torch facing forward. In front of them, they can see fairly clearly for about thirty meters.
She then shakes her hands in an extravagant fashion. "Ta-da. The next best thing. If you only use it at night, it should last you about five... hundered-ish hours, or something. Can set paper on fire, too, if you leave it in front of it for a minute, but I wouldn't suggest that cause it could smog up the lens."
Magpie blinks, eyeing the device with a critical glint in her eyes. "...thank you."
Wolf shrugs again, giving her a smile. "No problem. You can keep it; I haven't used the thing in a year or so, anyhow." She looks down at Natani, then back at Magpie. "So... uh, can I go in the wagon?"
It takes some effort, mostly on Zen's part than Wolf's, but the two swap places. As to why Zen is up front now, Ghost suggested that she shouldn't be left alone to her, but Wolf thought it would be better if a human face wasn't the one next to her. So it was between the brothers, who had one of their private conversations before Zen let out a huff and climbed up front, barely squeezing through the window.
The inside of the wagon is mostly known, other than a few wooden and metal lock-boxes keeping everything sorted. Much like the woman driving, it's a bit chaotic in its organization, with said basitin probably half knowing where everything is. If she keeps looking, she'd probably see some other weird things hidden around here.
She's not in a snooping mood, however, and the wolf shooting glances at her every half-minute isn't encouraging it either.
On one of his passes she makes eye contact with his mis-matched ones. He seems to pay a bit more attention to her, ears facing forward. He doesn't say anything, however.
She... doesn't say anything, either. She really, really wants a sip of ether, but it's either that or try to amend... whatever she just did before the ambush.
Dredging up her courage, she says-
"Thanks." The wolf says first.
She pauses. "Thanks?"
Natani suddenly looks... embarrassed? Probably the embarrassed equivalent for wolves; he brings a hand up to rub the back of his neck, breaking eye contact. "Yeah, for helping us out. Zen told me you two did a bit of cooperating to make that work, and you did it all on the backfoot. It's impressive."
"That, and..." He moves his hands in a circular motion, as if to help bring out his next words. "You saved me. You didn't have to."
She gives him a small smile, leaning up against the side of the wagon. "Don't need a reason to help people, fluff. I'm practically born to help everyone who deserves an assist, whether they wanted it or not."
He looks back at her, head tilted. "Even a couple of assassins?"
She shrugs. "Are you saying you didn't want to be saved?"
"No!" Natani exclaims, then takes a breath to calm down. "I mean, you just helped us out of a really bad situation right after..."
"...right after I did... well, whatever I did, right?" Now it's her turn to look down. "Uh, sorry about that. Again. I should've waited to start experimenting before I start using Light on magic. Especially since I knew you two were some sort of special case."
His face turns wary, again. "What do you mean?"
"It's kind of obvious you two are using telepathy. Uh, speaking to each other through your minds, and all that." She elaborates at his blank look.
Ans there's the recognition she's looking for. "Right. That." One of his ears turns sideways and... wow, that's adorable. Minus the hair - which is stil so weird - both of the brothers and Klein are honestly a treat to talk to. Magpie, too, for that matter; the confusion of what she is still hasn't worn off, but how happy-looking she normally is tends to keep the strangeness at bay. "Why... did you do... whatever it is you did?"
"Ah. That. I caught you two cheating."
"Oh." There's a pause. "Wait- you knew?"
She leans a bit harder against the wall, then lets out a sigh as long as it took for her to slide down into a sitting position. "Sweetheart, I've been throwing knives for as long as I can remember. You don't make that kind of throw without some sort of outside factor helping you. I would know, I was the cheat more than a handful of times. Claimed I was just lucky every time."
She then bites the inside of her cheek. "That. and I'm, like, seventy percent sure I'm sensitive to magic? Felt Zen doing something right around when you threw that knife, and I have a... technique of some sort that suppresses most acausal abilities. Thing is, I kinda have no control over what it does and doesn't suppress? It's an 'all or nothing' sort of deal."
From what she can guess, his face shifts towards acknowledgement of her answer and maybe a bit fearful? Makes sense, really. "You said 'light' like it's more than what it is. Is... that what makes you do to make that wyvern head appear? Or how you jumped off the air, back there?"
Oh, he saw that, didn't he? She turns her attention towards Ghost. "Wouldn't hurt to explain a little bit to him, would it?"
"Hm..." Ghost takes a moment to answer. "Keep it vague. Still don't know if he'll talk about you after this deal is finished."
"Okay." Out loud, she says. "No, that's Transmat. It's like..." She waves a hand around, trying to find a way to dumb down a Golden Age invention. "Someone a long time ago found a way to turn objects into pure information and, through that, makes the movement of items a lot easier. With a vault, you can hold items like so," She hold up a knife and, after asking Ghost nicely, watches it disappear in a blue flash. "In a space that kind of doesn't exist, like a bag that's bigger on the inside. It's limited to a set amount of space, 'cause storing matter as pure information is pretty taxing on vaults, but it's dead useful for people like me."
She can tell that some of her words flew over his head, but he pays close attention to her regardless. She sees a brow ridge raise, which looks weird on a wolf head. "...that sound like something magic could do." His eyes shift to the side in thought. "Maybe. I know there are enchantments that can make small pocket spaces, and if you could pair that with a spell to recall items..." She can practically see the gears turning in his head.
She shuffles around her pockets, looking for her flask. "Don't think too hard, Natani; might set your hair on fire from all the work your brain is doing."
She gets an unamused look in return. "It wasn't going to go far, anyhow. There's a small problem called 'being too poor' that I haven't figured out how to fix."
"Sounds like you need to make a spell for that. Aha!" She holds up her prize. "Definitely need you, after the day I had." She screws off the cap and brings the rim to her lips, tilting the bottom up and letting the cold vapor-liquid slide down her throat. After a swig or two, she stops and lets out a blissful sigh. In front of her, a sparkling blue mist leaves her mouth and slowly dissipates in the air. Almost like magic - now that she has a frame of reference to.. whatever kind of magic this world has - she feels whatever subconscious thoughts that were plaguing her slowly fade away, leaving a pleasant, passionate calm in its wake.
She can visibly see her shoulders relax- which she wasn't aware was even tense in the first place. "That's the stuff." She gathers up whatever flavor is left in her mouth and swallows again. She knows Drifter tends to warm people not to drink this stuff, but honestly he's probably just saying that to mess with others. They're a bit of kindred spirits in that sense.
She's still going to shoot him in the face when she gets home, but that's besides the point.
Then she holds it enticingly over to Natani, shaking it slightly to lets the glowing vapor rise out of the flask. "Want a sip? We just escaped a bunch of slavers by playing them like a bunch of fools and merked half of them; it's celebration time."
As Natani looks down at the flask, Ghost butts in. "I'm not sure how safe giving ether to random aliens is."
"C'mon, what's the worst that can happen? It's not like I'm the Mindbender and making Hive worms into high explosives."
He just huffs in response as Natani slides down next to her. He pushes away her flask, however. "I'll pass, still. But you still haven't explained how you managed to jump off the air itself." The wolf gives her what she thinks is an expectant look.
"Oh, right," She closes up the flask and puts it away. "So the Light is sort of..." She tries to think of a good way to put it. "The easiest way to put it is that it's like magic, but not. It's more of a physical manifestation of a philosophical concept; one that being creative is what wills everything that lives to survive. The opposite of that is the Dark, which - yet again - is like magic, but it's all about who's stronger gets to survive."
Seeing him drink in all she's saying, even if he's starting to tilt his head slightly in confusion - which is still adorable, what the fuck - she keeps going. "But, as a Lightbearer, I have more of it than the average person, and I can use it to literally defy physics and logic. Like, for say, defy gravity by temporarily, harshly reversing it like another jump. I can do it a couple of times in a row, but it's killer on the ankles if I try to do too many too quickly. Another thing is wielding certain elemental powers, but that's a whole 'nother subject and I've been talking for two minutes straight." She stretches slightly, then feels something move next to her hip. Looking down shows the sidearm she set down.
Natani looks at it, too, hearing the scraping noise. "What's that? I heard it and I swear it's like those fireworks I see alchemists work on."
She shrugs. Alchemists... and fireworks. Interesting. "A gun."
"...okay, and what's a 'gun'?"
"A weapon."
He shoots her a blank look. "Wow. Thanks for clarifying that, I couldn't tell from the hole you put in that salver's hand."
She grins. "You're welcome."
They stare each other down, wolf versus Wolf.
Then they hear a shared laugh come from outside, causing both of them to look at the little window and break their little contest. With said distraction, she has Ghost take the weapon away into transmat. The last thing she needs is to explain firearms; she doesn't want to introduce to these people one of the easiest pieces of warfare to kill people with, much less explain how they work. Natani's a smart cookie, so the less he knows the better.
She sighs. "Oh thank the Traveler, I was hoping he was the one who could talk better out of us three."
Natani manages a small smile, which is still strange to see on a wolf face. "Yeah, he's a bit of a sweet talker. You should've seen him when we were younger, though; couldn't chat up a girl even if he tried. We, like, ran exercises to try and get him to talk to someone he was sweet on, back in..." He drifts off.
Seeing an opening, she nudges his side. "Sounds like me."
That pulled him from whatever bad memory he was about to drift right into. "Wh- what?"
She shrugs. "Yeah, like," She waves a hand at the window. "I might sound like I can talk... okay enough, but it's not like I can see a hot guy or gal and just say," She pulls a crooked grin, deepening her voice and looking at an imaginary person. "Hey babe, wanna do the sex?" She shakes her head. "No. Just... no. I'd rather square off with Taniks, again. Fighting's easy. Actually just screw talking in general, I might just go back to being the strong, silent type."
The silence after she said that is long enough for her to look back over to Natani, and... "What's with that look?"
It's like he forgot to breathe, because he turns away from her and coughs a bit. "N-nothing." He clears his throat, which sounds strange... yeah, she might as well stop feeling surprised at hot strange they are; might as well just pretend it's normal. "But... well, I'm not too keen on human ages, but you must've seen someone who caught your eye. You ever had anyone?"
She laughs. "Ha!" Then immediately lets out a breath. "Nope. I've... kinda been a workaholic my whole life. Any time I did get to myself it was either spent with my fireteam, someone my fireteam knows, training, tinkering, or dancing. No time to play with someone's heart that's only going to end badly for either one or both of us."
He tilts his head. "...dancing?"
She nods. "Yes. A sacred act fit for any occasion. Truly the best thing ever invented, right next to transmat and peanut butter. Why, Natani," She waggles her eyebrows exaggeratedly. "Are you asking for a dance out of little ol' me?"
Thankfully, it had the effect she wanted and he laughs, too. "No, I'm not, it's just... surprising, I guess. That," He rubs the back of his neck. "And, well... I don't know how to dance. At all."
...what.
"What?" She says, the word dryer than she thought she was capable of doing.
He backs up a bit at her tone. "I'm serious, there's kind of no reason for me to know how to; it's sort of pointless."
"Wha- pointless?!" She raises her voice near the end. She narrows her eyes. "Take that back."
"...take back what-"
"Alright, now you've done it." She stands up in a single motion. "Get up."
His ears flatten. He breaths out a "What-" Before her hand strikes out and grabs the collar of his robes, hauling him to his feet so hard he stumbles. "Wait, what're we-"
"Shut up," She points a finger right onto his nose - huh, it's cool to the touch - eyes hard once again. "You've insulted a sacred tradition of all Guardians everywhere, and now you're gonna pay the price." She steps right up to him, and keeps going until his back hits the wall of the wagon. The sudden turnabout of her behavior is making his muzzled face do some hilarious acrobatics from how many emotions are coloring it. She doesn't let it stop her.
"Welcome to the Young Wolf's crash course of busting it down: get ready to boogie, wolf-boy."
Natani whimpers.
As the two inside struggle, and a quick peek through the link from Zen, he chuckles. Magpie looks over to him, smiling. "What's with the chuckle, Mr. Assassin?" She says playfully.
He shakes his head. "Oh, nothing," He points back inside. "Just my bother eating his own words."
"In what way?"
"He pushed Wolf's buttons, and now they're dancing."
"...like, dancing-dancing, or like-"
"Yup, dancing-dancing."
"...that human is crazy."
"You're just now figuring that out? She hasn't even taken the collar off, yet- oh, shit," He leans into the window, interrupting what looks like an intimate embrace if it wasn't for how stiff Natani is and how miffed Wolf looks. And how his brother keeps messing up the steps. And... yeah, that's not a dance he recognizes. "Natani!"
Both of them look up, freezing in place.
"We forgot our stuff back there!"
"...shit."
Wolf, however... blushes? "Um, actually... well, how do I put this?"
She snaps her fingers, and in a flash of blue light both of their packs appear next to the wall.
Both the bothers stare at it, then at the hunter. The hunter moves her hands back down to her hips, where Natani's hands are. "I might have, quite possibly, stole your things, just in case you had any ideas when I won and tried to stab me in the middle of the night. But hey, everything worked out and we're like friends now and stuff, so..." She grins nervously.
"...when did you take it- you were in eyeshot the whole time."
"I am never going to tell, and torture will get you nowhere."
...this human is going to be the end of him, and it won't be by murder. His head hurts.
So.
I might be making another Destiny crossover story, and I somehow forgot about finishing up the last thousand words this chapter needed up until a couple of hours ago.
I, like, wrote 5k in one day, sat on it while I worked, then wrote about 30k worth of other things before remembering about this.
I am not sorry.