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Frigoris's Partner

Enduring Muse

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User Image The soft green mountains had taken a suddenly sharp turn - one like nothing Cricket had ever seen. The slopes had grown steeper, and the only old path that they could take had led them into a mineral-encrusted valley from which steam billowed. She wasn't sure whether to be amazed or afraid of the sticky rotten-egg smell that roiled from simmering pools - but the pools, while far too hot to drink from, held astonishing colors in their depths. The earth under their hooves echoed, as if water was sloshing around below them. Like walking on a Kawani pottery jar.

Bemused, Cricket turned to Ethan. Their travel had been tinged with awkwardness, now - while they had been cheerful, the tone of their journey was not as it had been before that fateful night. She tried to ignore it, but it was there nevertheless. "Do they have things like this while you live? I've never heard of it." Her ears tipped back as a gust of wind brought more rotten-egg smell to them.

Kamiki's Partner

Winter Trash

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User ImageEthan was amazed at how quickly the vibrant green of the scenery in which they had been traveling for the last few weeks seemed to melt suddenly into this barren valley. The shrubs and grasses that they had grown accustomed to were gone, replaced with cracked earth and the sparce yellow weed that seemed to barely cling to life. A few lichens smattered the exposed rocks. However, this land was ahead, and the sharp mountains to either side seemed less hospitable than this cracked earth, at least to him.

Ethan shook his head, the awkwardness of the journey since that night falling to the back of his mind as well as he looked at this strange land. "Never." He shook his head. "I've never seen anything like this before." He craned his neck to get a better look in one of the first pools that steamed with that ... unique scent. An ear flicked back for a moment.

"What do you think all this is?" He couldn't get over the odd sensation of the place as a whole. It was warmer here than the grasslands, even during the summer. The air seemed to ripple with heat, especially over the strange pools with the colorful bottoms. Ethan had enough good sense at least to presume that the water was not safe to drink.

Frigoris's Partner

Enduring Muse

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"I have no idea. I've never heard about anything like this!" Cricket arched her neck to peer at a colorful pool without getting too close to the edge. "It's so colorful. Maybe this is where rainbows come from? But rainbows don't smell bad." She wrinkled her nose.

Suddenly, about twenty feet away, what had seemed to be just a funny mounded-up hole - like a normal mole-hill, only crusty and drippy with mineral deposits - let out an alarming burble. Then there was a hiss, followed up a gush of steaming water that shot straight up into the air, a temporary fountain. It only went six feet high, but that was enough to send Cricket squeaking backwards, her eyes wide. "It spat!"

Kamiki's Partner

Winter Trash

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Ethan chuckled at Cricket's suggestion about where rainbows came from, but at the sudden spluttering and the subsequent explotion of steaming water, Ethan backpedaled quickly, ears pressed flat against his head.

"What in the hell?!" The exclamation slipped out reflexively. HE stared at the column of stream as it blasted skywards. "Maybe... maybe you're right..." Ethan had to admit. Between the amazing colors in the water and the gout of water... maybe this WAS how rainbows formed. "It's nothing like the stories I heard, though. Unless the rainbows start in dead place like this and end with treasure... But I never would have thought that a cracked place like this would spawn a rainbow."

Carefully, hesitantly, Ethan edged closer to the font, ears pricked forward. It smelled like the pools - rotten eggs - and the hot water splattered his muzzle, but he didn't seem to pay the droplets any mind.

He pulled his head back and shook it as the strength behind the gout seemed to be dying down.

Frigoris's Partner

Enduring Muse

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"Oh..." Maybe it wasn't that hot, after all? Cricket crept forward towards Ethan, but as the steam touched her she squealed and darted backwards with a skid of pebbles. "Ouch! That's hot! Ethan, are you okay?!" she stared, panting a little. That had scared her!

Kamiki's Partner

Winter Trash

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Ethan blinked in surprise as the steam scalded Cricket. "Are you okay?!" He quickly trotted up to her, looking at the angry, reddened patch of skin where her muzzle had gotten too close to the blast.

His brows furrowed in confusion. His muzzle had touched the spewing steam but not sustained such damage. "Yeah... yeah I'm fine. I mean, it stinks. But... no, my nose is fine."

Growing up away from human settlements, Ethan had never really experienced fires or heated water. Certainly, he could fully appreciate that some days were much hotter - or cooler - than others. But he'd never given a second thought to preferring the summer over the winter.

Frigoris's Partner

Enduring Muse

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"No... I'm fine, it just scared me that it was so hot, all of a sudden..." Cricket peered at Ethan's skin. Not a burn, not a scald mark, not even any extra redness. Nothing! "How did you do that?"

Kamiki's Partner

Winter Trash

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Completely oblivious, Ethan shook his head with a confused look. "Do... what?" He pondered a moment, and then, in a feat of logic... leapt to the complete wrong conclusion.

"The spout? I didn't do that! It just happened!"

Frigoris's Partner

Enduring Muse

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"No, no, not that," Cricket said, sticking her tongue out. "I meant stick your face in that hot water and not burn your muzzle off! Maybe it has something to do with your father, too... unless your mother could do that?"

Kamiki's Partner

Winter Trash

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Ethan blinked, the thought never having occurred to him previously. "I... guess so." He shook his head, bewildered. Ethan was of course not unfamiliar with the concept of burns. Plenty a cautionary story had been told by his mother about the dangers of fire, of the branding iron that was sometimes taken to the flank of a horse or other domesticated animal. But Ethan had not put two and two together in regards to the natural water spewing from the ground.

"No, I doubt mom would'a given me that." he continued, subdued. Another mark, even an invisible one, from his father.

He looked around the landscape, cautiously curious and returned to Cricket, pressing against her side. She could sense a protectiveness about him as he realized the potential danger to her.

His youthful, often puckish face was serious. "I wonder what kinda place this is... I don't see any bugs... any birds..."

Frigoris's Partner

Enduring Muse

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"D'you think it's a bad place?" Cricket's ears tilted backwards, just a little. "But it's really pretty... and I don't see any predators or anything?" Another vent hissed and spat steam, and she gave it a careful look, not flinching away but certainly not getting any closer. "Water coming out of the ground, all hot and stinky and colorful...? I've never seen anything like that before."

Kamiki's Partner

Winter Trash

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"I dunno." Ethan admitted. "I've never even heard of any place like this b'fore. It IS pretty though. Not pretty like the places I've seen before at all." Ethan tentatively walked closer to one of the stagnant, stinky hot pools. The color that lined the basin was brilliant. But if this was where rainbows were from, where were they? The jets of hot water seemed uncolorful.

"This kinda place... you think it's gotta be for something. Other than smellin' bad and sprayin' water....? I don't think rainbows would come from a place like this."

Frigoris's Partner

Enduring Muse

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"I don't think it's a bad place. Bad places are ugly and smell... er... well, this place smells, but not the same way?" There was a trace that ambled among the geysers and pools, and Cricket tentatively moved forward along it, her tail swishing back and forth. "This place isn't ugly, it's just... weird. And there's no grass. I don't think anything lives here..." Maybe they should turn back, but this journey was about exploring, wasn't it? Taking a closer look at what lay ahead couldn't hurt, could it?

Kamiki's Partner

Winter Trash

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"I dunno. Maybe it's a diff'rent kinda bad?" Ethan murmured as he stepped alongside Cricket. His curiousity was obviously piqued as well as he wandered forward and sniffed at a strange mound of bubbling mud. He snorted, his tail flipping to and fro.

"I wonder what lies on the other side... or if this place leads somewhere." This strange place lent an electricity to their journey - truly making it feel more like the adventure that had until recently felt like an awkward hike after their ... awkward discussion.

Frigoris's Partner

Enduring Muse

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"Then let's go," Cricket said, with a decisive nod. "Maybe the pools that make the rainbows are a little further on, huh?" She trotted ahead, placing her hooves carefully, but the trace stayed a decent distance from the scalding pools.

It wound upwards after a bit, and the rocks became softened, waterfalls of stone carved by long mineral drips. "Wow..." Cricket stared and stopped, her skin twitching as the breeze blew some steam past her. "This place is just full of weird stuff." But still no grass or plants, except for a few high up clinging to the ridge.
Gaia Forums » MISC Forums » Forum & Sticky Archive » Breedable/Changing Pets Roleplay

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