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 Posted: Wed Oct 08, 2008 3:13 pm
Jay walked back to the part of the marked up road and knelt down by the drag marks poking at them just slightly. It looked as if the wagon had been dragged sideways for a distance, even upon reaching the woods.
Micheal turned his head as he walked around the area for a while. "The rains seems to be cleaning up what was left behind." He spotted the markings of hoof prints in the road. It looked as if horses pulling the wagon had been panicked, their tracks seemingly stopping at the edge of the woodline where it looks like they might have been dragged.
"Damn rain's washed out anything that might be of use to me. If there were bandits here, I can't make out hide nor hair."
Micheal boomed with laughter. "Bandits. Yeah."
"That's about my feelings about it being bandits as well. If this was the wagon, it was literally pulled from its side on the road. A dragon maybe?" she thought aloud, trying to think of what might be strong enough to move something like that.
"I really hope this one doesn't fly," Micheal stated as he watched Jay draw her bow and started scanning the sky.
She looked up at Micheal. "Well if it was a dragon, it certainly didn't land." She grabbed two arrows from her quiver and started to follow the dragmarks toward the woods.
Micheal closed his eyes. When they opened again, he scanned the area with a new type of eyes. This one had a hint of another animal in them - dragon most likely.
Looking through the starting edge of the woodline, there are branches and brush bent and crunched down where the wagon first entered until it straightened itself out. All the mess seems to have come from the movement of the wagon though. Still no signs of tracks belonging to what might have actually dragged the wagon though. Interestingly, outside the rain, the area is strangely quiet for the woods.
Closing his eyes once again, Micheal opened them and they were back to his normal ones. "Gah, some help he was..." he yelled out in frustration. He then rubbed his finger on his forehead. "You sure it's not because of me?"
Concentrating on the scene of the woods, the ranger's head sharply turned to look at Micheal in a slight jerk. "Who are you talking to... wait, Dark?" Micheal's voice against the lack of sound from the woods was starting to put her on edge as her eyes only lasted on him a moment before looking back out into the trees.
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Posted: Wed Oct 08, 2008 10:33 pm
Micheal looked in her direction before lithely running to her side. "You want to go in," he said, trying to control his frustration now.
"If you need to talk with your dragon for a moment, go ahead. I'll wait, but keep it down... at least for my sake. Not everyone can move as fast as you," the ranger replied, a grave look on her face as she looked up and over at him, water dripping down her cheek as a few drops snuck by her hood. Her own voice had sunk into a whisper even with Micheal right next to her.
While the sound of the rain didn't pose a problem for his hearing, it posed a problem for hers. Micheal looked at her and his voice was barely heard over the pattering. "Dark is being difficult when I tried speaking with him. As of speed you can be as fast as I am," he thought out loud as a diminutive smile crossed his face.
Not of my own abilities," Jay said, ignoring his smile. "Are you finished speaking with him or are you waiting on some information from your dragon yet?"
Micheal clenched his fangs. "I've was done talking with him when he started quoting my own blasted statements."
"Okay, so done," she whispered as she looked into the woods. "If you sense anything out of place, warn me if you can," she added before stepping forth into the broken up part of the trail, beginning to follow it.
His focus then was from one area to the next, taking every detail, staying just behind the ranger. After a short stretch of time, he lightly chuckled. "I bet some coin that I am going to need a new shirt again."
There was the sound of a forced sigh from under the cloak ahead of him. "I leave you to bet with yourself. I don't have the spare to do otherwise," she muttered, giving in to an answer.
"There's some in your saddle bag," he mentioned offhandedly.
"Yours if anyone's then as it wouldn't be any of mine," she muttered.
Micheal looked at the ruts in the ground some more as the wagon's tracks began to straighten out just as the road disappeared behind them. A little ways ahead, the ground started to gradually go downhill, eventually banking more steeply.
"Any ideas?" he asked, noticing that the wheel ruts were not as deep here.
"There's nothing other than the damned wagon trail from what I can tell," Jay said, apparently angry at what seemed to be a gap in the information before her. "This isn't dragon work. If a dragon got the wagon, there would have been pieces everywhere. Other than back at the road, there isn't even a hoofprint out here."
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Posted: Wed Oct 08, 2008 10:34 pm
Micheal then stopped moving, narrowing his eyes. "How many wagons did the merch say he had again?"
"Just the one. Four people. Two horses."
"There is one up ahead, not in good shape," he said, eying what looked to be a smashed wagon in the distance. It looked as if it might have picked up speed going down the hill and crashed into a tree.
Micheal shook his head. "Only four people."
"That's what I thought when he mentioned the amount," she grumbled, looking in the direction Micheal mentioned. "I've got to get closer. I can't see it from here with the brush."
The vampire looked at her and nodded. "We aren't too far."
The ranger chose her steps carefully down the hill as it became more steep, sliding where there was no grip but seemingly not bothered by it. When reaching the bottom, she crouched for a moment as she looked around. Seeing nothing, she stood up and carefully moved forward through the brush in the direction the wagon had to of gone, sticking close to trees for cover.
Meanwhile, Micheal's eyes narrowed again as he heard a very faint clicking sound in the distance, almost sort of muffled. With the rain and the distance, it was something he was fairly certain the ranger's ears couldn't pick up.
Being particularly territorial over the situation, his fangs bared, his voice intruding on Jay's thoughts. 'We aren't alone. To the right is something amused by our efforts.'
The ranger paused immediately against the next tree where she stood still, throwing a glance to the right. "Can you see what it is?" she whispered.
He lightly growled a warning growl to see what ever it is would react. The clicking noises seemed to disappear for a moment and then continue in the same fashion that they did before.
'No,' he answered.
"See if you can find whatever it is that is supposedly watching," Jay whispered as she looked toward the wagon now within her sight. "I'll check the wagon and see if there's anything there. With any luck, at least maybe I'll find a body of this guard. It'll be at least something that might hint what's going on."
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Posted: Wed Oct 08, 2008 10:42 pm
'I am not having you out of my sight,' he growled in her thoughts, continuing to watch the area around her carefully.
"Fine. But keep an eye out for whatever tripped your trigger. If I enter the wagon I'm not going to have any line of sight," she whispered as she stepped forward and silently walked in the direction of the wagon, it's front corner smashed in from the tree it hit. Not only that, it was slightly tipped to the side though not completely.
Inside, crates and boxes were broken. Shattered glass reflecting what little light from the tree infested corner lay all about, even outside the back door. No body was to be see anywhere inside the wagon, however. There wasn't anything moving at all from what the ranger could see.
In the meantime, Micheal started sniffing the air randomly to see if he can pick up a scent at least in the muddling rain. At first there was nothing.
But then the wind picked up and he frowned.
It was faint, but it was there even with the rain making a mess of everything. The smell of flesh, dead. Maybe decayed. Just a hint of blood. Some of the smells indistinctly resembled ones from the road they had come in by.
'Smells like a fresh graveyard here,' he commented, taking a breath in as he began to slowly walk in her direction, growling every now and then as he went.
"All I have is a big mess here," Jay replied as she inched closer to the back. "There's no one here, alive or dead. Hard to tell if there was a struggle with this thing in the shape it is in." Taking one last look around her, she stepped through the crooked door at the back, glass crunching under her boots though she tries to step around as much as she can.
Getting a closer look, some of the broken pieces of glass are in fact not glass at all but mirror shards. Intrigued but for a moment by a quaint reflective piece, the ranger continued looking around, skimming over the shelves and broken containers that were lying about before a scrap of paper next caught her eye. Taking care of the glass and other sharp objects as she wasn't wearing gloves, she picked up the paper and read it over. In her hand was a list of contents for particular crates.
"Well, he wanted proof..." the ranger muttered, remembering what the merchant in the town had asked for, as she stuffed it into a belt pouch.
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Posted: Thu Oct 09, 2008 12:34 am
Looking around the back of the wagon revealed little else. There were some small blood stains on either wall that the rain hadn't been able to wash away, but other than that, it was much less of a gory mess than what she had expected. Jay exited the back of the wagon with a small hop down and out onto the wet ground.
"Seen anything yet?" she asked in her hushed tone to Micheal.
He stopped growling for a moment. 'No, not unless you want to see where this graveyard is.'
"Maybe it's best we do," she whispered, moving to meet up with Micheal. "There's something... 'wrong' about all this." When Micheal nodded, she continued. "You'll have to take the lead." She held her bow ready once again in place and set an arrow against the string. "I don't know where this place is that you're talking about."
Micheal nodded again as he took a deep breath in and then sniffed the air to pick up the scent once more, starting to walk in that direction.
The scent led them farther into the woods, maybe just shy of twice the distance they'd already covered. As the smell grew stronger to him carrying with it a distinct acidic taint, he scrutinized the area even more.
'What acidic beasts do you know of? This one is new to me,' he asked the tracker behind him before pausing to listen to his surroundings before choosing to speak aloud. "There looks to be a cavern up ahead in the ground. Maybe the survivors took shelter from the rain."
"Acidic..." she said, as if questioning herself. "Maybe a larger lizard, but those are neither from these parts or probably large enough to drag a wagon."
When Micheal chose to speak aloud, she looked behind her to see if he attracted any unwanted attention but didn't see anything. "Survivors? Taken shelter or dragged there themselves, I wonder," she muttered, waiting to get close enough so that she could see this cavern that Micheal was talking about.
The vampire laughed. "At least there was an effort," he said, still sounding clueless.
"Would you quiet it down already!" she hissed at him, not amused by what she thought was a joke.
He looked back at her as she hissed. "Why wouldn't you want the survivors to hear us so they know we are looking for them?"
"Because I don't think there are survivors unless I see them," she whispered. "You already blew it when you mentioned it smelled like a graveyard anyways." She started taking her own steps forward with care whether or not Micheal was still leading, until she spotted the wide hole in the ground or at least what might be it.
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Posted: Thu Oct 09, 2008 12:37 am
Micheal looked at her and then at the cavern. "Good point, but it's good to hope." When he stopped speaking, he realized the clicking noise he had been hearing stopped when he had gotten loud. Spontaneously, the sound then returned, this time much louder. Now, where there might have been one before, there were two or three sources now coming from inside the cave.
Standing still for a moment, he tried to mimic the clicking noise coming from the underground cave. There was another bout of silence from inside before the clicks picked up once again to level they were before.
Jay said nothing about the last line as she watched the mouth of the cavern for a time. Not seeing any movement, even when the vampire beside her made some sort of clicking noise, she decided she was going to move in when a voice infringed upon her mind again.
'What's the line?' Micheal asked artlessly.
"What??" the ranger asked confused and tense at the disruption.
He continued to explain, 'I hear clicking noises. The cavern is going to make things more difficult... rotting flesh... echoing sounds. My sight, strength, and speed are my options. And if you get hurt... let's just hope you don't.'
The ranger tipped an ear toward the cavern, straining to hear whatever Micheal was hearing, her muscles burning to move forward and look down through the entrance. Whatever it was though still remained hidden for her, either due to the distance or possibly the sound and smell of the rain.
She looked back at Micheal trying to read what he was hinting at. "What does that have to do with the line?" she asked, forcing herself to be patient, continuing to occasionally glance in the direction of the hole.
Micheal looked forward and away from her gaze. 'If this ends up being too much, I will get you out either by carrying you or make you a temp pawn.'
A frown sprung up at her mouth. "I have no problems with the former, but the latter isn't going to make me any faster if we run into anything," she muttered, watching the cave entrance again with narrowed eyes.
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Posted: Thu Oct 09, 2008 12:42 am
'Wrong,' he boldly answered back, shaking his head. 'So I told you. What's your plan?'
She grumbled something incoherent as she let it go. She had made her say and he had made his. "First things first. I want a better look," she whispered a she got up and worked her way to the entrance of the cave that opened to the sky like a overly large well.
"This could be interesting..." he said as he walked up to her side and looked eyed the inside of the cave. The opening was probably about the size of the wagon though it would have been a tight fit if anyone had tried. He could see the bottom of the pit, a good four story drop. Something he could easily handle, but too sharp for a slope for his human partner most likely. There only seemed to be on direction that branched off from the bottom of the cave, but from the height and angle they were at, it was hard to tell were it might lead.
"Fraking bladeshards," the ranger cursed under her breath as she looked down the hole.
Micheal looked at her. "You say some unusual words..." he said before holding out his hand in a gentlemanly fashion.
"You would to if you were me," she said, now briefly hearing a click or two from the cave as well. She looked over at his hand. "It's not the drop," she muttered looking down. "Worse to worse, I'd just use rope. Well... depth is the problem in the sense that I was expecting it to be more shallow which would give it more light."
Micheal stood aside patiently, waiting for the ranger's indecisiveness to leave as she looked over the arrows in her one hand and then the bow in her other hand. Quietly, she put the arrows back into the quiver and latched it shut before hooking the bow in it's holder at her back.
She retrieved a small torch from her backpack and some flint from a belt pouch, immediately working to strike up a flame at the end of the torch using her cloak to block the wind and water.
While Jay fussed with the torch, a thought came to her mind. "Is there any way to actually get down to the bottom without the torch going out if I get it lit?" she asked.
Micheal shrugged at her question "It's not like I bother with a torch."
Well, there goes my idea, she thought to herself just as the torch should take light.
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Posted: Thu Oct 09, 2008 12:58 am
The vampire began to get impatient. "Just take my hand and make this easier."
"I don't know if I'm going to be of any use down there, she said, looking over at the hole resentfully. "I'm going to be blind as a mole." She straightened up, looking at Micheal.
Well, if worse comes to worse, I can just wait at the bottom of the entrance, she thought to herself as she lifted and placed her free hand into Micheal's outstretched one, waiting for him to tell her to put the torch down or for him to jump and it to go out.
Instead, the vampire chuckled. "You're going to have to come closer... not unless you want me to rip your arm out of its socket."
"Fine," the ranger said, giving in and moving in as close as Micheal lead her to be while trying to keep the torch away from the vampire by keeping that arm held out and away as far as she dared it.
He watched the torch and carefully took it from her hand, holding afar from both of them as he curled his arm and hand around her. "Comfortable?"
"I'm good. Let's just get this over with," she whispered, looking down at the hole beside them as she wrapped her arms around his shoulders.
He looked down and then took a step to the edge where he turned around like he was heading way from the hole.
Befuddled, the ranger began to ask, "What are you d..."
He then took a careful step backwards leaning over the edge before continuing his backwards pace, like he was walking on land but it was just walking on a wall. "Trying not to harm you or your flame," he finally answered.
The answer went unheard by the ranger as her arms gripped around him tightly like freaked out cat minus the claws, low-volume curses slipping from her throat at the initial step back that took them over the edge. Her eyes were as wide as an owl's at this point and if her adrenaline wasn't going before, it sure was now.
Micheal couldn't help the smile that came to him. "Jay, I said close but not that close... though it's kinda nice."
The ranger just growled as she held on, the string of curses had finished, her wait for the ground more important than making any sort of crack back at the vampire.
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Posted: Thu Oct 09, 2008 1:16 am
Micheal just left it at that till the torchlight started to touch the rock floor, and he stopped about a few feet above the ground. He looked at Jay. "You can let go now."
The ranger looked at him with a slight glare, looked down at the floor, and then looked back at him with nearly the same glare before she instantly just let go and dropped to the floor, making a light thud as her boots hit the wet dirt and rock.
Micheal waited for her to grab the torch while he kept his eyes closed to its ever-changing light. "Sorry," he said.
"Apology accepted," Jay muttered as she took the torch from him and then turned away to look down the tunnel that led away from the bottom of the entrance. When the torch flickered a bit, she took few steps toward the tunnel to move it away from the skylight the rain was still coming down through. So far it didn't look like there was anything out of the ordinary. Moss, rock, cobwebs, water... though some of that was probably just from the rain.
Micheal chuckled as he hoped up like he was heading out of the hole but then landed straight down, facing the tunnel the ranger had started down. With a hesitant frown, he asked, "You can see okay, right?" The torch would be a set back for his own sight, but it was something he would deal with for the time in being if she could see as well.
"A little ways, not terribly far though," Jay replied, switching the torch to her left hand while getting her sword out with her right. "Nothing looks unusual," she whispered, but her sound was much quieter than before, as if she was trying to hear over herself.
She noticed the clicking had stopped.
The ranger's sword was held out defensively in front of her as she started to move down the tunnel. If she couldn't smell the scent of decaying bodies before, the smell reached her nose now the farther she got, now understanding where Micheal had come up with the acid comment. There was something off about the smell.
Maybe the bodies have been tampered with, she thought to herself as they moved on.
Micheal started to think of what would make a clicking noise. Dark had done that when he was a hatchling, but then he wasn't this destructive either. Dark had eaten whatever he had brought to the little dragon's mouth back then.
Clicking...
A shell creature, insect....
Then he watched the walls and ceiling. "I never liked spiders," he said, just as he heard the brief sound of scurrying from a side tunnel far up ahead of them.
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Posted: Thu Oct 09, 2008 1:41 am
Micheal narrowed his eyes to get a better look, but with the torchlight in the way, it was making it difficult to distinguish the T-section at the end of the hall. "Jay, it moved... whatever it is," he warned, continuing to watch the hallway ahead of her.
The ranger said nothing immediately as she was straining to hear and see what she could, though she paused for a moment. "Which direction?" she asked very quietly.
Micheal picked up a rock near his foot as he looked at the tunnel that branched to the right. "In the right, but I have a feeling it's maybe more than one. Shall I?" He tossed the rock up and caught it in his hand.
Jay looked behind her to see what Micheal was referring to. "What, are you going to hit it around the corner?" she asked in disbelief.
He nodded and waited for her permission.
"I have no better ideas," the ranger answered with a shrug. "I'd rather have them gone at range than fight them up close anyways," she said as she started to drop back and let Micheal take the front position.
The vampire held the stone like a skipping stone and chucked it hard and fast at the back wall causing it to ricochet and vanish around the corner, hearing it hit a few more times with a few flicks of light as it briefly striked the rock walls. Then there was distant screech that echoed down the tunnel before he heard more skittering followed by the clicking picking up again to new levels now.
"Did I get it?" he asked, uncertainly.
"How should I know?" the ranger asked, her eyes jumping back and forth from Micheal to the end of the hallway where the screech had been heard.
'I think I did. It has a lot of legs,' he thought back to her as he made his comment, his sensitive hearing picking up another set of skittering legs coming from the left even as the clicks start to take on a kind of growl to their sound which is now coming from both directions of the T-section ahead of them.
"Are you telling me that it really might be spiders?" Jay asked, a little louder than she meant to.
"I hate spiders," Micheal sighed as he knew this was in fact the problem now.
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Posted: Thu Oct 09, 2008 1:51 am
"But they would have to be the size of..." she trailed off as she could hear the clicking reaching the end of the hallway in front of them, Micheal definitely hearing it before seeing anything.
"No prints. No broken branches. Water would have washed the webbing away if any." He then narrowed his eyes. "And they are big."
As if on cue, a big, black and moss green, multi-eyed head with clicking jaws poked its head around the corner soon followed by the rest of its bubble shaped body.
"Aw s**t... you had to be right," the ranger complained, now not bothering to be quiet at all.
"And acidic none the less," he added to the ranger's unhappiness as he listened to the skittering from the right AND left now. He growled lowly as his knuckles cracked, ready to fight and get Jay out of there.
The first spider that popped out began to make some sort of screechy noise, its unpleasing screech made more so as it reverberated off the cavern walls.
"Quiet or do you want to wake the dead!" Micheal shouted at the screeching.
The ranger winced a little and took a step back as the screeching sound echoes off the stone. "Noisy bastards," she muttered, adjusting the position of her sword.
"No, we are getting out of here," Micheal said back to her as he heard her shift her stance.
It was as if the first spider stopped for a second to consider Micheal's command before it made a new sound audible to the vampire, two of them similar to two small blasts of air. Then he spotted two small quill sized object flying quickly in his direction.
"Gryph?" he said with and odd look, cursing his own word as he dodged the speeding darts, the two of them clicking on the stone wall somewhere far behind them.
Jay takes a step or two back as she sees more movement at the end of the tunnel, another large spider coming into view from the right side this time.
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Posted: Thu Oct 09, 2008 1:53 am
Micheal spun around, grabbed the torch, and with a swift move, grabbed Jay's newly freed up hand, spinning her as he dragged her with him. "We are leaving." A growl escapes his throat as travels toward the exit, seeing something he doesn't want to see hanging there... two somethings, eight legged and clicking away at him and the ranger.
The ranger winces as she gets spun around while at the same time another round of darts from the spiders can be heard by Micheal. There are easily three, maybe four behind them now from the sounds.
"I hate you all!" he just roared as he narrowed his eyes and slowed down his speed. "Jay, grab on," he tells her hastily.
As she takes a second to shove her sword in her sheath to free up her other hand and grab on, there is a stab in her thigh as she reaches around his shoulders, the ranger grinding her teeth together in attempt not to yell.
Micheal's eyes widen as he looks to see how deep it hit her while one barely nicks his arm. Still running but with faster pace now, he holds on to her tightly with one arm, growling and cursing every word he knows.
"Damn it! I hate them... hate them with a passion!" he says while reaching the base of the exit to the cave, now only needing to climb out. In the meantime, he attempts to take cover in a small corner sheltered by a few fallen rocks that are there. "Jay, are you okay?" he asks, taking a moment to check on her while he can. He glanced at her leg but with the torchlight and the two spiders not far away distracting him, it was hard to tell how deep it might have gone below the skin.
"Bowstrings just get us out of here!" Jay said through her teeth as soon as caught her breath behind the corner of rubble where there was cover. "Don't ask about it now!" she growled, looking up toward the exit and then down the hallway toward where the spiders were. She avoided looking at the side of her leg amidst everything going on.
He growled, propping the torch up in some rocks, hoping it would stay lit, and held onto the ranger with both arms now. He crouched before springing upward, jumping against the wall, kicking off, and jumping for the opposite wall only to do the same, all the while looking at the entrance as his lips curled further up his fangs.
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Posted: Tue Oct 14, 2008 2:01 pm
The two spiders hanging in the entrance skittered hurriedly away from Micheal's leaps, avoiding direct confrontation. One ran upwards and outside, the other rushed along the wall and moved downward, farther into the cave, both clacking and clicking at the intruder as they moved.
Micheal raised an eyebrow as he didn't expect their movement to be avoiding before he dashed past them and leapt out of the cave where he broke into an all out run. Slowing down after a couple miles out, he feels something protruding from the ranger's back, a quick glance confirming his dismay.
"Damn it, Jay..." he growled as he checked to see if he had been followed at all, but when he heard no response from the being in his arms, he looked at her as a slow confused look on his face grew. "Hey, Jay?" he slowly asked.
"Yeah..." the ranger responded, her eyes closed.
A tingling feeling crawled through her leg as if she had been sitting on it too long, a similar feeling spreading in her lower back as well.
The ranger opened her eyes, looking momentarily apprehensive when she did not recognize where they were. "Dulcimer. I need to get to Dulcimer though."
"Do you want me to carry you there? It would be quicker. Or would you like me to pull these stupid things out of you first?" Micheal asked, waiting, watching the ranger carefully.
"Yes... I mean, no. We'll take them out when we reach Dulcimer. Yes... just go," Jay said while adjusting her grip around his neck.
A growl came from the vampire as he noticed her hold was not as steadfast as before, and then there was something else he sensed was out of place: her heartbeat was slowing.
"You can kill me later. They are coming out now," his voice rumbled as he freed up the one arm behind her shoulders, hopping her grips was better than it felt, as he quickly pulled out the dart in her back followed by the other in her leg and dropped them on the ground.
When his words were spoken, a panic sensation flooded the ranger, plainly showing on her face. She opened her mouth as if to say something but it was cut off by a holler as the darts were torn out, blood beginning to well up and pool around both points of entry.
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Posted: Tue Oct 14, 2008 2:04 pm
"B...barbed..." she choked out as her eyes began to water.
Micheal gritted his teeth in anger, his body tensing up as he stopped breathing. He looked down at the darts he tossed at the ground and saw arrow-like tips with two additional prongs behind the lead point. "Sorry..." the growled with what breath he had saved. "Your heart," he started to explain, "it's slowing. Now, unless you have great control and can stop it in seconds from sounding like a herd of running of horses... so..." He looked at her and then back at the prongs in the grass.
"Dulcimer... now," the ranger growled back, trying to keep together some semblance of herself while trying not to put her hands around his throat for the sheer feeling of wanting to strangle him, vampire or not. "~I~ know what I'm doing."
'...but for how long?' she asked herself as she let Micheal adjust the way he held her before taking off running again. 'He just had to pull on them...' she thought in frustration just as they reached where she left her horse.
When the ranger muttered to be put down, Micheal lightly set her on her feet but watched her carefully. Just as he had expected, the ranger's steps faltered within the first few as one of her legs buckled. "Jay," he growled in a whisper, catching her before she hit the ground.
"Cursed venom," Jay muttered. "Can't move that leg. The other is going to go with it followed by the rest soon," the ranger said, sounding almost too calm for what seemed to be happening to her.
"In the saddlebag, the closest, there is a bag with medicine. For you, it'll probably be the smelliest one in there." A smirk struggled to her face but did not last very long. "Set me down drag it over here. You're going to have to do this," she said, squeezing her hands as the tingling feeling surfaced in her arms.
After setting the ranger down, he went straight for the packs trying to locate the drugs without smelling for it at all. After going through every pouch in a near frenzy while trying now to rip it all apart, he finally came across what looked like a bag full of smaller jars, bags, and broken bits of dried plant life. "Is it this then?"
"A green leaf stitched... in the bag's edge?" she said, trying to take in deeper breaths. Her lead bobbed to one side as she tried to look. "Yes, that's... it. Dump... dump it all out." She leaned forward, putting a shaky hand to her forehead before slowly leaning back until she was lying on the ground. "Ra... red... rem... rim jar."
He promptly dumped the bag. "Like lying down helped any," he muttered all the while sensing her system slowing down. He promptly snagged the jar before looking back to her. "Say awake, damn it. What do I do?"
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Posted: Thu Oct 16, 2008 1:00 am
"Trub... troub... le... moving," Jay answered in a strained tone.
'Just talk to me with your mind then. You don't have to speak,' he tried to say as calmly in her mind as he could before her senses began to mingle with his own: the feeling of being trapped, an encompassing sense of cold, the throb of pain in the back and thigh, the dripping of water down the skin, clothing becoming more damp to the sky above.
There was a quick response to his suggestion.
'Will... pictures work?'
'Yes.' Micheal then opened his eyes to the thoughts in her mind and watched. 'Think quickly.'
A stream of pictures flew by him of two additional jars with the red-rimmed one he had retrieved, the silent vision showing certain amounts being taken from each jar and tossed into a cup. Next it showed enough water being added to turn it into a paste which was pressed into each of the puncture wounds. More water was poured into the cup and then the cup was shown being pressed to her lips... until the scene was scratched out.
The pictures backed up to where water was added the second time, and this time it showed a picture of him adding a second dose of two of the drugs to the cup.
'Okay, I got it. Anything else?' he asked as his body tried to linger to the sensations that she was having at the moment.
'...just... do it...' she answered, her focus breaking apart as a faint memory surfaced, followed by a bubble of blurry laughter. The chilled feeling in her limbs, it was reminding her of a time during the whiteseason where she'd jumped into a lake... with no clothing. The memory filled her head with that of snowflakes and snow until it all drifted away from her.
Micheal, feeling that he was not meant to see these images, left her mind, a sudden surge of energy flowing through his body. There was the urge to run, move, jump... to just do anything because it had been just a small taste of living again. With a boost to his speed, he repeated the instructions he had been given, cleaned the mess, and within seconds was able to pull her under a shelter of branches.
He knelt there looking over Jay.
"I hope you're going to be okay..."
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