Tomorrow Never Dies

@Hollow

Shade from the thicket provided excellent coverage for those in need. Shadows waltzed in an eternal dance as the boughs of the trees moved back and forth in a light wind that caressed the branches in a loving embrace. One of these shadows flicked in and out of sight, a dark shape that hid behind trunks and moved downwind as the breeze did. It was a girl- an adult, now that she had finally turned two years of age. Still slim and small, never as powerful as her brother Ash. A task had been given to her by the leader of Secret Woodlands, for she was a hunter now, a feeder of the pack. Eva intended to take this seriously, though decided to make it a covert mission in order to entertain herself.

Right now she was a spy, sneaking in enemy land while watching out for other wolves and looking to stop an enemy informant. She was an adventurer; she had many years of experience under her belt and was well-renowned for her stealthy assassination abilities. Her good eye flitted back and forth amongst the foliage as she stalked forwards, keeping her head down and body straight. Somewhere here a messenger was hiding, attempting to escape from her claws and cause harm to her family. Eva would not- and could not- allow this.

Suddenly her ears perked and her body poised itself in an offensive move. She slunk forward, keeping close to the trunks and sliding against them as she walked, nose to the ground. There. A twitch in a bush, the little rascal thinks hiding in a plant will stop her from finding him!? A low, warning growl emerged from the pack of her throat. Make any move, and you're dead, it attempted to convey. Her prey did not appear to heed her as she stepped closer and closer. Almost....almost...

It seemed like her opponent intended not to take her advice, shooting from the bush in a sudden movement that nearly took her by surprise. Then both were off, weaving in and out of tree-trunks in a deadly dance. Sometimes Eva jumped too soon or too late over a root and nearly stumbled, which would classify the mission as a disaster. The nimble girl, however, managed to keep her balance somehow (her mentor would assure that it was due to her fine training, despite her own protests) and continued the dramatic chase.

"speech"

SECRET Woodlands

TEMPLATE © NDA OF RCR & RPG-D

(This post was last modified: Aug 09, 2013, 03:34 PM by Eva.)

Hollow moved slowly, his shoulder would brush a tree branch every so often and cause the male to flinch in pain. Bu still he carried onward, it was not a patrol but he was working all the same, tracking his pack mates. When eventually he crossed Eva's scent, and soon after that of prey, so with a youthful smirk, he began to weave his way through the thickets in a roundabout way. Until eventually he found him self scenting an approaching wolf, Eva as he had expected. He sat silently folded into shadows allowing only his eyes to glint from the shade of a low bush. He began to move around with stealth through the growth, trailing his scent in strange ways waiting for Eva and whatever she was chasing to appear.

Eventually Hollow had created a ring of fresh scent that had only one way in an one way out, depending on how the female appeared and whatever she was chasing appeared, they would be trapped by scent. It would no doubt cause a frenzy from the prey and lend Eva an easy kill. Hollow waited facing the direction he was sure they would come from waiting to see if this plot worked. If it did he would be sure to tell Iopah so that she may use this little trick. If anything Hollow's injury had allowed him to do other things he had wanted to. Less strenuous things albeit but they were things he had been meaning to do either way. His face was a mask and his ears and nose both twitched constantly in anticipation of what was to come.

Eva stumbled once more, misjudging the placement of a root. It almost sent her sprawling forwards but she kept running as quickly as she could in order to keep up with her prey. The quick turns and jumps began to tire out the 2-year-old and the distance between the hunter and hunted began to lengthen, much to Eva's dismay. She powered forwards to close the gap at least a little, but it was beyond her now. This other operative had the upper hand on her, and she had failed. The Hervok was about to slow down and come to a stop when a peculiar smell reached her nose. It was one she recognized, it was the scent of a Secret Woodlands wolf- and one in particular. She remembered him from meeting with the pups when he had nodded and then disappeared into the underbrush.

Her prey appeared to be equally startled by this fresh new scent that seemed to come out of no where. It was on all sides, closing in on it and it became disoriented. Eva took the chance to pounce, biting down on the neck of the rabbit she had caught. The family secrets were safe.

Picking up the kill, her mismatched gaze looked around for Hollow, the male that had assisted her. Without him this enemy would have lived another day and could have hurt her family. Eva smiled at these thoughts as she continued along with her game, at the silliness of it all. Her eyes found his striking blue ones before actually seeing his whole body, as it blended in with the tree's shadows quite nicely. She shyly averted her eyes, and then a genuine smile passed over her jaws, one of gratitude. "Mmnks" she attempted, forgetting that the rabbit was still held in her mouth. A flick of her ears showed her utter embarrassment, and she dropped the kill. "I-I meant.. thanks." Once again her good eye averted from his gaze, looking at the ground while cursing her own stupidity."speech"

SECRET Woodlands

TEMPLATE © NDA OF RCR & RPG-D

(This post was last modified: Aug 16, 2013, 05:40 PM by Eva.)

A small, mischievous, and slightly crooked smile, found it's way to Hollow's lips. Amused as Eva and the hare crashed through the undergrowth. There, the hare came into view and stopped, made circles around his scent trail, and turned tail to run directly into Eva's waiting jaws. Hollow watched almost unable to contain his excitement at having come up with a strategy for hunting that worked. Even harder to ignore was Eva's momentary confusion as she gazed around until she finally found him. So with a small huff of laughter he abandoned his hiding place and approached the she wolf as he should, with his head and tail set level over her, there was still no arrogance in his posture nor air of total dominance. It was almost as if he were merely keeping his posture up for appearances, which, unless he was on the border, is exactly what he did.

"You are welcome, and thank you for giving me such a good opportunity to test that trick out. I was unsure of whether we could confuse our prey with scent or not." He gave a friendly wag of his tail while his eyes searched as usual even in his injured state, he had become so accustomed to watching. His eyes constantly darted, to and fro. They focused and widened almost constantly while he searched. It was only a few moments that this look overcame him before his gaze rested once more upon Eva. Though his ears still twitched in all directions every few seconds. "How has your day been going, Madame Huntress." Hollow emphasized the word knowing how excited everyone would be about their given titles since until recently Iopah had been the only wolf officially titled.

Eva nodded shyly, still taken aback by the large male's sudden appearance. At least she had not vocalized her 'game' for everyone to hear... now that would be embarrassing. The female wolf abandoned it for now, cataloging it for another time when she needed some kind of premise in order to keep her attention on the prize. Her own spy identity would remain a secret, for now. "Thank you for helping me," the Hervok sister replied with a smile. The tactic was not one she had ever heard of being used before. Maybe other wolves did not have the imagination that Hollow seemed to have?

The male's eyes seemed to be moving quickly, from Eva to the surroundings and then back to her. She warily watched him, the smile faded, not quite sure if she had done something wrong or if he was just checking for predators that she might have missed. Her green eye watched his blue darting about before they suddenly focused back on hers, the Hervok's eyes now widening in surprise at the unexpected look. Madame Huntress? Eva smiled to herself. She liked that name. "Very well, Sir Guardian, thank you. How has yours been?" Eva recalled that Hollow had recently been promoted as well, and seemed more than capable of stepping up to do his job. The fact that he had an injury never even came to mind at this point.

"speech"

SECRET Woodlands

TEMPLATE © NDA OF RCR & RPG-D

(This post was last modified: Sep 01, 2013, 02:36 PM by Eva.)

Ramblerambleramble

Hollow gave a wave of his tail at the Hervok's words. It was always a pleasure to help his pack mates out, especially as it helped everyone when they caught their kills. Still, every once in a while Hollow liked to test out just how well he had gotten to know the Thicket. It would seem according to this hunt, that he was much better adapted than he had originally thought. "I have had a lot of time to think of things like that recently since, Nina has been keeping me away from the borders." He shifted his weight further from his injured shoulder so that he no longer appeared to be standing straight up, now he looked lopsided with one foot off the ground.

It was interesting how much he could tell Eva was of relation to Nina just by that striking shade of green in her eyes. It was almost an irony by his thought for her to have ever met him, whom had two working blue eyes with a ring of green in only one. Where she had only one working eye, which was green, and her blue one sightless. The fact that two wolves with such oddities had ever met was almost comical to the guardian. In his thought he had never responded to her question and suddenly realized he had been in thought for far too long. "Oh yes, it's been fine, I miss my patrols though, hard for me to stay put, as I am usually running everywhere I go." Even if I'm not that good at it. Hollow thought, he felt no bitterness at the fact. Merely because he did not need flat out running speed here in the Thicket. He needed stealth and maneuverability, which his size lent him, not too large to move quickly.

Sorry I'm slow ;-;

Eva looked at the Guardian curiously. Some details were simply beyond her at times, and Hollow's injury was one of them. Why would Nina keep the male away from something he enjoyed? It was only when she noticed his uncomfortable shifting of weight when the thought finally occurred to her. The Hervok looked at him sympathetically. It seemed like he had adapted to his temporary disability well, which was always a trait that Eva admired, particularly since he put the good of the pack before his own wishes.

Now it was her turn to move her weight around while the darkly-furred male seemed to inspect every meter of her eyes. She was used to the stares, but not from a wolf with such a piercing gaze as he had. Eva could not help but return the look, and mirror the color of his eyes to those of ice on a cold, winter day, before looking away towards the ground and not meeting his eyes again. Was it rude of her to inspect him so? The silence continued as he did not reply, and suddenly he seemed to come out of a trance and spoke. She was surprised by the suddenness of the words, and looked up at him, the rabbit laying forgotten at her feet. "It is great that you still enjoy yourself though," she replied with a smile, "Especially with your injury. It can be trying at times, I'm sure."

A thought occurred to her, yet she was almost afraid to ask because of the answer she might receive. Hesitating for a moment, Eva mulled over the thought. Surely he had somewhere to be other than here, right? He was probably busy with something else, but the girl enjoyed his company. "Would you like to try out that tactic again? Or maybe a new one?" The invitation was tentative, and the Hervok prepared herself with the words of "I have somewhere else to be." Yet she stepped beyond her boundary of comfort and put herself out there, for the sake of possibly having a partner in crime, at least for a while.

"speech"

SECRET Woodlands

TEMPLATE © NDA OF RCR & RPG-D

(This post was last modified: Oct 28, 2013, 12:08 AM by Eva.)

"I love to protect this pack, and everyone in it, and would suffer a million injuries if it meant providing you all with safety." He spoke seriously first and followed it up with a much lighter tone, "So I guess you could say I enjoy what I do." Hollow smiled at the Hervok, in a friendly way, she seemed like a good heart and Hollow certainly respected that. Then she made him an offer he couldn't refuse, after all, there wasn't a lot he could do with his shoulder injury so he had plenty of free time to whatever he pleased to do. "I would love to! I've had a lot of ideas while on the borders, things the pups can be taught."

Hollow's tail began to wag as he became excited with the prospect of doing some sort of training. "See I was thinking we use the Thickets to our advantage, now I can get from one side to the other faster than most wolves in the pack, but that is because I have patrolled it so very many times. What I've been trying to perfect is a way to train all of our pack mates and the pups so that we can hunt more efficiently and be more formidable in a fight.." Hollow spoke almost breathlessly hoping that Eva would help him expand on some of his ideas. For he had many, and once they were perfected he could train the pups, and teach all of his pack mates his new moves. They would all be signature and only known by Secret Woodlands Wolves, at least that's what Hollow hoped.

Eva's green eye brightened as Hollow accepted her invitation, and relief flooded through her tense body. She allowed her small form to relax and an audible sigh of relief left her jaws. Flicking her ears in embarrassment, she listened to Hollow as he began speaking of his ideas. He very quickly articulated his goal, and to Eva it seemed that he had been hypothesizing this tactic for a while. An energy radiated from him as he explained in almost a single breath. His eagerness seemed to transfer to her own body and the Hervok could feel her anticipation build.

"It's a good idea to use what we've got," she commented, thinking to herself though all she wanted right now was to jump and leap and expend the energy that was pulsing through her veins. "We should bring the pups here for training, definitely, maybe hold a race for them? They'd like the competition, right?" Though Danica did not seem to be one for competition, certainly she had a thirst for learning and maybe even to prove herself deep down. Bane and Ashton could probably form a rivalry that would be a sight to behold and would encourage them to work hard and learn.

"What moves have you thought of?" The Huntress did not have much experience fighting in the thicket but would always be willing to take advantage of the opportunity to help the pack. "Could you teach me some?" Hollow certainly seemed to know what he was doing and had much time to mull all of these ideas for fighting. His comment on being one of the fastest in the pack brought a smile to her face, and for once she wondered whether or not she should challenge him for the title. The girl let it go, content simply learning and not overreaching a boundary.

"speech"

SECRET Woodlands

TEMPLATE © NDA OF RCR & RPG-D

(This post was last modified: Nov 30, 2013, 07:46 PM by Eva.)

Hollow smiled as Eva seemed to perk up further, even injured it seemed he had found a way to help out his pack. Which made the young guardian very happy. "Well I was definitely thinking the pups should be taught some fighting techniques, which I guess would also transfer to hunting." Hollow stopped and looked thoughtful for a moment, knowing that all this stuff he had come up with would take some explain. The wind stirred the fur across his shoulders as his face turned into a concentrated mask. So many idea ran through his head surely he would not be able to pick out just one. But of course in time he did come up with what he would call. "The Basics."

"Well first, being that this is a thicket, we should be learning the foliage, what we can jump through, and what we can't. Some of the brush is flimsy and we can get through with minimal injury. Also if we know what we can't get through, or what would hurt larger prey, we could use them as snares. We should also draw prey into the thickest places, where we know how to maneuver. As far as actual strategies, I've found that general stealth, and splitting up to attack from all sides, seems to be the best way to get things done." Hollow was breathless now, but looked as though he were an excited pup. I wonder what Nina will think of all this? Hollow thought happily.