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 Posted: Tue Feb 24, 2009 3:26 pm
 The air hung heavy in the Jungles of Sleep. Buzzing insects and screeching monkeys disturbed the sereneness of the green labyrinth. The pale green painter threaded her way through mossy trees and over-sized palm fronds. Hanging vines caught on the edges of her wings despite trying to keep them snug to her body. Above her, a purple mimicgryph darted among the tree limbs.
A speck of color caught her eye. Dreamer stopped to admire the white orchid that had fought its way through the undergrowth to bask in the warm light. Noticing her interest, the mimicgryph dove from the branches above to land on a branch near the flower.
“Pretty,” he squawked.
"Yes, very pretty, Saba," she replied. Dreamer wiggled her nose close to the orchid, inhaling it's aroma. "Lovely."
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Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2009 4:19 pm
 Not too far away was a particularly dense patch of the jungle, thick with moss, overgrown ferns, and vines and shaded by tall trees. Nestled in the moss was the skeleton of a long-dead male painter, curled up as if he died in his sleep. Three mimicgryphs were curled around his bones, a particularly vibrant blue one nestled among the skeleton's ribcage trying to sleep while the yellow and red mimicgryphs tussled atop the bright white skull, chirping and chittering in their game.
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Posted: Mon Mar 09, 2009 8:40 pm
“There are many mysteries here, Saba,” Dreamer said, talking more to herself than to the bird. “So many mysteries.” The mimicgryph hopped to another branch with a questioning chirp.
“Do you see something interesting?” Following the bird’s gaze, Dreamer looked towards a deeper part of the jungle. “It’s petty thick over there. I don’t think I can fit through those trees.”
Saba’s chittering grew more excited. Without warning, the purple mimcgryph took flight and headed towards a thick growth of vines. Dreamer had no choice, but to follow as best she could.
The pale green painter caught up to Saba when the bird lighted on a branch. The bird cocked his head, listening. Dreamer caught the sounds of birds chittering close by. She looked up at her pet bird, “Friends of yours?” Saba took off from the branch and flew into a thick growth of ferns. He almost immediately flew back out. Landing back on the branch, he hopped back and forth, squawking, “Pretties! Pretties!”
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Posted: Sun Mar 22, 2009 1:18 pm
The red mimicgryph looked up when she heard the excited chirps of another of her kind, and she took to the air to investigate, leaving behind a sulking yellow mimicgryph who was none too happy about her game being interrupted. The blue male lifted his head groggily but made no move to leave his comfortable nest inside the dead painter's ribs. The red one, however, was very inquisitive and gripped onto a vine overlooking the strangers in their territory, chirping down at them curiously.
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Posted: Sun Mar 22, 2009 2:02 pm
Dreamer's pet bird had a natural curiosity about everything. For Saba, "pretties" could be anything from food to flowers. Dreamer didn't recall when she'd seen the purple mimicgryph this agitated before though.
The painter's attention was drawn to a different chirping from the vines hanging above her. "Well hello there," she said to the red mimicgryph watching them. Standing on her hind legs, Dreamer stretched to get a closer look at the red bird.
Saba, not wanting to be left out, flew up to perch on Dreamer's head fins. Fluffling his feathers, he let out a long stream of chirps and chitters at the red bird. Dreamer chuckled to herself. Saba was most definitely introducing himself to the pretty female.
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Posted: Fri Mar 27, 2009 1:30 pm
The red mimicgryph squawked at the two newcomers once more before she dove back into the foliage and flitted over to her previous perch on the painter's skull. Her bright yellow and orange companion then took her turn to investigate. The blue male was still far less inclined to be nosy and instead stayed curled up in his comfortable nest inside the skeleton's ribcage.
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Posted: Tue Mar 31, 2009 7:08 pm
The red bird disappeared back into the foliage, but was soon replaced by a yellow bird of the same species. Dreamer’s curiosity was piqued as to where the birds were coming from. Brushing through the vines and pulling back overgrown ferns, the green painter pushed through the undergrowth to find where the other bird had disappeared to. Pushing back immense palm fronds, Dreamer found herself looking into a clearing among the trees. In the middle of the clearing, amid deep moss, lay a painter skeleton. From the position of the bones it looked like the painter had simply laid down to rest and never woken up. The red mimicgryph that had chirped at them earlier was now reclining on the skull. A more elegantly plumed blue mimicgryph was nested within the ribcage. She wondered if the birds had been pets of the painter and were still waiting for it to wake up, or if they’d simply found the skeleton and now called it home.
“I wonder who it was,” Dreamer mused aloud. Saba, for once, had nothing to say.
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Posted: Wed Apr 01, 2009 7:33 am
The blue mimicgryph was suddenly abruptly aware that strangers were in his immediate vicinity, and he let out a shrill squawk of alarm as he tried to scramble out of the skeleton's ribcage so he could hide. It took him a few tries, but he managed to scrabble out from between two ribs and darted to a low-lying branch, unable to fly very well due to his very heavy plumage.
His panicked escape made the very leaves on the ground shiver - but no, they continued to twitch even after he had perched once more. The creaking sound of tree branches in the wind filled the clearing before the skeleton abruptly moved. The spindly bones of bare wings slid slowly along the jungle floor to tuck themselves firmly against the dead painter's sides as the skeleton's long neck raised almost sleepily. It shifted completely to its feet before bright blue flames ignited in its empty eye sockets and looked down curiously at the strangers in its clearing.
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Posted: Tue Apr 07, 2009 5:43 pm
Saba chittered happily at the blue bird. “Pretty!" he exclaimed, hopping to a branch closer to the blue mimicgryph to peer at him. When the skeletal wings moved of their own accord, the purple mimigryph’s friendly chirps changed to a frightened squawk. Saba retreated to a higher branch behind Dreamer.
Dreamer backed up a step as the skeleton rose to its feet. Torn between her common sense telling her to vacate the vicinity and a fascination with the unusual, she stared at the collection of bones that had come to life.
“Umm, hello?” she said tentatively.
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Posted: Sat Apr 11, 2009 6:36 pm
The skeleton peered down at the intruding painter with its bright blue, flaming "eyes", looking her over silently before it actually spoke, "You don't seem afraid. Are you not surprised?" Its mouth didn't open as it spoke, yet its voice was powerful and easy to hear despite the noises of the jungle, seeming to resonate from the bones themselves.
The blue mimicgryph squawked again and clumsily flitted back to the skeleton where he curled up on the dead painter's spine and chirped quietly, "Cel! Cel! Strangers!" The two females jeered at him from their perch in the trees, laughing at his fright.
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Posted: Sun Apr 12, 2009 7:01 am
“Surprised, yes. Afraid, no,” Dreamer said wonderingly. Her ears twitched slightly. He didn’t sound angry or vengeful. But with bones that seemed to have a life in them where one wouldn’t normally expect to find one, how could you be sure?
“I often come to the Jungles of Sleep to learn of its mysteries,” she said with an eagerness in her voice. “Course, no one much believes me when I return with tales of what I’ve seen,” she added with a touch of disappointment. “They say I just fell asleep and dreamed it all.” Dreamer gazed at the flaming blue eyes, “Am I dreaming now?”
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Posted: Sun Apr 12, 2009 8:53 pm
"No, I don't believe you are," the skeleton replied, surprised. "I can't recall the last time someone saw me and didn't run away immediately," he added in amazement. This was, indeed, very unusual - maybe he was the one who was dreaming.
"I am Celeritas."
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Posted: Tue Apr 14, 2009 7:59 pm
"I have to admit that there was a part of me that told me to run," she grinned sheepishly, "but my curiosity got the better of me." Dreamer had so many questions she wanted to ask, but she knew she'd already invaded his privacy. She was afraid he might not want visitors. "I'm Dreamer and the purple fluff in the tree is Saba."
The purple mimicgryph chirped at the sound of his name. "Pretties," he said, looking at the red and yellow birds.
"He likes your birds," Dreamer continued. "I'm guessing they're your birds since the blue one called you by name." Hesitating, she finally added, "You're rather... unique."
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Posted: Wed Apr 22, 2009 4:08 pm
"Unique..." Celeritas repeated, and the tone of his voice indicated that if he had skin, he might have smiled. "That is a word I have not been called before." He turned his head with the rumbling groan and hollow clatter of bones clanking against one another to look at his friends. "They are my friends." He nodded to the red and gold mimicgryphs in turn. "Lado and Caldera. The shy one is Inouva." The male seemed to puff up a little at being called shy, but he didn't dare separate himself from the safety of Celeritas' back.
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Posted: Sun May 03, 2009 2:22 pm
“It’s good to have friends," said Dreamer, thinking of her own lack of close friends. Too much time spent with her nose in books or musing about the mysteries of the Jungle she thought to herself. "I would imagine you don’t get very many visitors out here."
He was curious to watch. There were no connections between his bones that she could see, but they moved as if they were held together with invisible muscle and sinew. It made her more aware of her own fleshy composition. She suddenly felt like an intruder.
"I hope I’m not being intrusive, to wander in like this and disturb your sleep."
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