Silent Moon Plateau Dress up like hipsters

@Cottongrass

She had waited until @Avery was well and truly asleep to slip away. She knew he wouldn't wander far, and if he did, well he had a nose to track her down. She wanted a better look from up high (for all that she would be able to see under the starlight and the meager light of the first quarter moon). She slipped here and there, muted curses muttered under her breath. She hadn't been able to use the bad words at home, but uncle Val had taught them to her none the less, a grin tugged at her lips wondering what he would make of their progress? It had probably taken them twice as long to get here as they should have but wasn't he always 'taking the scenic route' too? She chuckled under her breath, yeah, the old man would find this hilarious.

The mountain ahead was enough to deter the girl from continuing on her path. As the earth flattened out beneath her paws she stopped to catch her breath. Yeah, here should do nicely! Turning her head to the west she moved up to sit on the edge of the plateau, squinting to try and make out anything that might be a Lagoon or a cedar forest, or even a long line of Willows to tell her they were close... but it was hopeless. With a click of her tongue and a heavy sigh she would just have to resign herself to dragging Avery up here tomorrow. Wasn't that gonna be a barrel of laughs?

A part of him couldn't help but wonder if there would ever come a time when he wouldn't be hopelessly lost. Tonight wouldn't be that night, but he still liked to think about it. Even if he was probably at fault for why he was lost, again, in the mountains of all places. Because somewhere along the way he managed to wander off the beaten path, and Neha seemed to have just... disappeared from his side. He couldn't remember the last time he saw the girl. It couldn't have been more than a week or two, right? He discovered those orange blobs that he still wasn't entirely sure the name of. And there was that cliff incident that happened not too long after that he refused to think of. At that he shuddered, picking up his pace because not today trauma.

And -

He wasn't expecting anyone to be there, and boy oh boy that couldn't have been anymore obvious. For a second he froze - muscles tense, eyes wild, and one of his front paws dangling awkwardly in the air because he was caught mid-step. He blinked. But common sense knocked into him, and he started his quotidian shuffle of 'please I swear I'm normal just wait.' He put his paw down and straightened up his stance from his prowl, yellow eyes blinking from bewildered to curious. His tail wagged, a gentle sway back and forth behind him.

"...Hi?" Perfect.

(This post was last modified: Nov 06, 2016, 05:48 AM by Cottongrass.)

you don't know about me, but I'll bet you want to

Victoria Balik

The voice from behind gave the girl such a start she jumped, one paw slipping precariously over the edge of the plateau. It might have been terribly dark but it was bright enough for her to know it was a bloody long fall if she didn't lean back. High on adrenalin and a little pissed off about being scared out of her mind she rounded on the stranger "Just what did you think you were doing?! I COULD HAVE DIED!" Taking a moment to steady her breathing as shakes overtook her frame as her anger quickly morphed to relieved laughter, that grew more and more uncontrollable as the seconds ticked by.

Her legs could no longer support her now she was away from the precipice. Her laughter was so bad she was struggling to breathe, drawing air in with rather undignified honks when she could manage it at all. Soon she was panting, stretched out with her flank against the frost covered grass, giggles still escaping her mouth at random intervals as she tried to get herself under control. Pushing up to rest on her elbows she could only hope her company hadn't abandoned her to her lunacy entirely. "I'm...' giggle "I'm sorry, you just startled me!" she finally managed to choke out before she drew another deep breath and tried to slowly exhale. More giggling. No luck yet.

(This post was last modified: Nov 06, 2016, 06:26 AM by Victoria.)

"Sorry!" He yelped, voice crackling as he flinched backwards from the rounding girl. Somewhere in his chest his heart jack hammered away, a painful thumping rhythm against his ribs as blood pounded in his ears. Because she was going to kill him. He didn't know how, but if he had to guess he'd say that his heart was going to explode. And it would all be her fault. The worst part was that he didn't know where to look, his gaze directed down at his paws because looking at her was too awkward.

He didn't dare breathe, posture tense with his ears pinned back and expression guilty like some kind of scolded puppy. It was an accurate description of his emotions right then, because he was all too ready to accept whatever the hell she was going to do to him. Except - except was that laughter he heard? He balked, and he was sure his heart gave out with the way it plummeted straight into his stomach. How... how was he supposed to respond to that? An expression that was somewhere between pained and uncomfortable overcame his features. Behind him his tail hung limply, like a deflated balloon.

She was honking. He had no choice but to draw his gaze upwards, yellow eyes coming to rest upon her form as she rolled on the ground. A hiccup of laughter might have escaped him because damn it, her laughter was infectious. He shuffled in earnest confusion because the lines between nervous and amused were blurring together in the back of his head. His hiccup of laughter grew into something more that was nowhere near the girl's level, but he was giggling along all the same. He felt light-headed as something he could only describe as bubbly and fizzy built inside of him.

His yellow eyes glowed and he gave a step towards her, legs wobbling because the world was spiraling out of control and he was caught up in it. "You startled me!" He barked, finally letting gravity do its work as he slumped onto the ground before her. Now on his stomach he gave an eager wiggle forwards, tail swinging behind him.

"You're - you're insane." It wasn't a judgemental statement by any means. Instead it was a pleased, keening sigh in the back of his throat as laughter bubbled up around his words. He was smothering and couldn't have been happier about it, drowning in the emotion of adrenaline.

(This post was last modified: Nov 06, 2016, 07:22 AM by Cottongrass.)

you don't know about me, but I'll bet you want to

Victoria Balik

As the strange boy countered that she had scared him, she laughed again. It seemed to be her lot in life to go around terrorising her poor sibling but now it would seem that extended to strangers in the night as well. Vic snorted when he declared her insane, mock fury lacing her voice, "How rude, you don't even know my name and you're jumping to conclusions!" Although it was far from the first time she had been called insane and this was probably one of the more polite phrasings she had heard to date. She might have bothered to poke her tongue out if she wasn't so concerned about biting it with the next fit of giggling, although her breathing was becoming more regular as time went by.

Her slowly returning senses were enough to remind her why she had risked life and limb to climb this bloody mountain (in the dark) to start with. "Hey do you know where we are? Me and my brother, we're looking for a friend but I think we got turned around a bit..." She struggled to keep the hope from her voice, a beaming smile back on her face as her tail waved in time with his. Of course, chances were he was just as lost as she was, but maybe, just maybe, he had more of a clue than she did.

"I'm rude." He breathed, smug and teasing as he gave her a mocking shake of his head. But nothing came of it, and instead he lapsed into silence as he struggled to catch his breath. The world still felt woozy and he was tempted to break back into giggles. How the girl got a hold of herself so quickly was beyond him. He pulled himself up on shaky limbs, biting back a tired laugh as he did so. Being serious was hard. In the end he had no choice but to settle on his haunches, and even than he wobbled.

Hey do you know where we are...

Her voice interrupted the buzzing emptiness of his thoughts, and he drew himself straighter in interest. That sobered him up and any hint of a smile or giggle faded from his face, his jaws clicking shut as he gave his lips a nervous lick. "No." He shook his head no, gaze downwards because wow did he feel like garbage. He wanted to help, but...

"I'm uh, probably more lost than you are right now." All he could offer was an apologetic shrug of his shoulders and he could already feel his mood dropping. Peering into the darkness around them he saw nothing remotely familiar. His gaze drifted back to the she-wolf, and he gave his fore paws a shuffle of nervousness. Yeah, he had nothing.

"I was supposed to - I was supposed to meet, uh, someone up in the mountains who would show me around. But I lost them." He winced because that about summed up his usefulness in all situations and his entire life so far. His expression was bashful, smile sheepish with his shoulders drooping around him.

(This post was last modified: Nov 09, 2016, 01:36 AM by Cottongrass.)

There is a family of deer nearby. Hunt Opportunity

@Cottongrass

you don't know about me, but I'll bet you want to

Victoria Balik

His addmission of being more lost than Vic herself was enough to get her giggling again. "How do you lose someone? Don't you have a nose?" she teased, pushing herself up into a seated position while failing to take into consideration the early snows and autumn rains. Paws slippped and she slid back down bringing another snort of laughter from her chest. "Well, I mean I think I know where I am... I feel like I know where I am... do you ever get that?" Avery didn't, but maybe if he'd just relax for once he'd feel it too.

Thinking of her brother and watching the boy before her another idea struck her like a thunderbolt, "Hey, why don't you come with us? Three of us should be able to hunt okay, and it's starting to get pretty cold at night. Better to be lost with friends right? I'm sure we'll find what we're looking for eventually!" There was no dragging her down, she was convinced it was in all their best interests now, and how impressed would Avery be if she dragged another bigger wolf along to help scare off the bogeymen and yeth hounds? "C'mon, say you'll come with us?" her cajouling tone was well practiced with wide eyes and an innocent smile.

She was very used to getting her way.

He thought long and hard at her third question, racking his brain for some semblance of an answer. There was one at the tip of his tongue, a vague jumble of words that he couldn't cough up. He got what she was asking, kind of. But - there was nothing that resembled what he thought she wanted to hear. There were no bangs, there were no sparks, and there were no other onomatopoeia for epiphany in his brain. Instead all he thought was buzzing. The noisy kind of buzzing that felt like static underneath his skin. He shook his head to clear his brain of the sound. Maybe he didn't get the sensation she was describing.

"Nah, I'm just always lost." His face lit up with a grin, the words rolling easy off his tongue as he gave her a careless shrug. Something to draw some other reaction from her, one to make up for his lack of understanding. He wanted to agree with her, really, but he was terrible at lying. His original thought of like your somewhere right kept chiming on in the back of his mind. He forced it down.

She was talking, anyway.

His head cocked and his ears swiveled forward, because wow did she had a way with words. In all honesty though, she could've stopped after her first invitation and he would've been eager to follow along. But she sold her idea well, and he found himself once more growing giddy. "Okay." He nodded once, to himself, and then to her in excitement. And unable to contain the obnoxious energy within - bolted upright on his paws as if to say hurry up. His movement could be best defined as a dorky shuffle of eagerness with his tail lashing behind.

It was then, a very important thought struck him and he stumbled to a halt.

"But shouldn't I at least know your name?" He blurted out, his mind suddenly whirring with the warning of stranger danger. Which was odd, because he could've sworn that the battle of self-preservation was lost the moment he stepped into the world beyond his parent's territory. But bless his brain's last ditch effort at saving him. He blinked at her, brow furrowed in honest confusion.

@Cottongrass If you want to wrap it up with your next reply then we can claim LP :D I'm going to assume they went down and @Avery had already woken up and moved so they split up to try and find him for the cave thread if that's ok? (I'll get a reply up over there after I reply to my other thread)

you don't know about me, but I'll bet you want to

Victoria Balik

It was nice to see her own enthusiasm reflected in someone else. Maybe, if this guy came with them, then Avery would perk up and realise the big wide world wasn't nearly as horrible as he thought. The white wolf's upward movement was matched with one of her own, a stumble forward bringing her shoulder to crash against his chest or flank (she didn't stop for long enough to figure it out, her own enthusiasm driving her back towards the path that led back to the lower ground). It was only the sound of his voice behind her that caused her to paused, "Oh, umm... Vic... Well, Victoria, but please, just Vic," she answered across her shoulder with a smile and a wave of her tail. "How about you?" she finally thought to ask in turn, sure it would have come up eventually anyway, but deciding it was probably best to ask now he had.

"Oh we better get goin'! If he wakes up and I'm gone he'll panic... He's a bit..." of a fraidy cat... "out of his depth out here..." she covered with a grin. The sun was beginning to touch the edges of the horizon and if he wasn't up now he would be soon. She didn't want to worry him anymore than necessary.