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 Posted: Tue Mar 13, 2012 11:23 pm
As though on cue, there was a sudden movement behind them, and Alex startled, turning his head to see that Isabella was approaching them. She stopped, taking a small step back, before lifting her hand shyly and continuing forward.
"How are you guys doing?" She whispered, her hair hiding half of her face, and she reached up to tuck half of it behind her ear, though left the part that covered her empty eye socket in place. She then stopped, tilting her head as though she could hear something, and Alex stared at her curiously, not having heard anything at all. Her nostrils flared as she sniffed at the air, and she lifted a hand to point.
"Nathaniel." She said simply, and Alex had to grin.
"Yin, would you do the honers of capturing my brat---I mean, brother and depositing him in the prisoners area? After that we can probably go and have a look for the other teams skull, if you'd like"
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Posted: Tue Mar 13, 2012 11:51 pm
"Greetings Miss Isabella," Yin whispered back to her as she lifted her hand. Then she did something a bit odd. Nathaniel was out there? He turned his gaze toward where she pointed, but he had not really seen anything. But apparently it was to be his honor to capture him?
Alexander probably did not wish to walk that far.
"I shall return shortly," he promised, and then raised his goggles up from where they rested around his neck and quickly secured them. Protecting his eyes? Apparently he was preparing for the worst. He slipped away from the hideout, using the terrain to mask his movements and moving almost silently. Once he had gone quite a few meters he began to see the form of the large zomboil. Prey.
In the woods, and with the much more inexperience younger boil, it was almost too easy to slip around and tag him. A solid tap for this one. "Tag. Please accompany me to the prison."
Nathaniel's face twisted into a scowl. "Green jerk."
Yin eyed him, not impressed. "This is a game and you have just been captured." Nathaniel turned to walk in a different direction and Yin quickly bypassed him and was in his path again. "The prison is in the other direction." He turned to begin walking toward the prison.
Nathaniel did the smartest thing that he could think of at that moment. He saw a smaller boil that in his mind was insanely smug and egotistical, and he had his back to him. He wrapped his arm around his neck and Yin reacted immediately, simply bending forward and rolling the zomboil over him and back first onto the ground. He looked down at him, slightly annoyed. "Get up. If you follow me now I shall not have to tell anyone how ridiculous your attack was."
Nathaniel had already proven that what he was thinking at the moment was not exactly bright. He got up, but he lunged at the weremantis. Yin stepped to the side, reaching out for his arm and twisting it behind his back, holding him lightly but firmly. "The hard way it is then." As they began to get within sight of the other guards he lowered the boil's arm, though he kept his hand around his wrist. Nathaniel has swore up a storm the entire way there, but apparently he was too much of a chicken to actually risk his arm getting broken. Yin left him in care of the prison and slipped off to rejoin Alexander and Miss Isabella. Five captures for the mantodae.
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Posted: Wed Mar 14, 2012 12:06 am
Alex had to laugh at the small commotion he could hear from the area that Isabella had pointed to, knowing full well that Yin could easily handle himself around the brutish, young, and dumb Nathaniel. Isabella smiled as well, giggling to herself behind her hand. When they watched Yin go by with Nahaniel secured within his grasp, Alexander may have gazed after the weremantis somewhat adoringly, and Isabella nudged him with her elbow to get his attention.
"You were staring." She smiled, "You like him, don't you?"
Really? Even his little sister could tell? Alex gave a small shake of his head, and a warm smile, reaching down to mess up her hair, and she squawked in disgruntlement. "Mind your own business, Izzy." He said, though he was grinning now, even while the back of his neck started to warm. "We're just friends." And would likely never be anything more, but Alex was...okay with that, for now at least.
Yin returned shortly afterwards, and Alex stood up, brushing the dirt and moss from his pants with his hands.
"If you want to go and have a look, we should go now. Izzy can stay here and look after things. She's...well, she's faster then most of the family, so she'll do a good job. I think we have quite a few members of the other team captured now anyways."
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Posted: Wed Mar 14, 2012 12:19 am
"Thank you for taking our place Miss Isabella," he said with a slight dip of his head before beginning to walk back toward the forest. "So our goal is just to go and retrieve the skull and not get tagged while doing so?" He was just looking for confirmation as they moved through their territory. "Are we allowed to free our teammates as well?"
After a while they actually passed into enemy territory, though it all looked much the same to Yin. He kept a careful eye out for landmarks, just in case he needed to hurry back on his own. They were moving along fairly casually when Yin saw a splotch of unnatural color. He reacted without thinking. One hand shot up to pull Alexander behind a tree, the other reaching up to cover his mouth as he put the zomboil's back against the tree, motioning for him to be silent before daring to look again.
Closing in he stretched up to whisper as quietly as possible to the zomboil. "Ghoul. Brown hair, light purple shirt. Left arm skeletal but flesh still on the hand. Enemy?"
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Posted: Wed Mar 14, 2012 1:03 am
Alex shambled along beside Yin, waving to his sister as they left her in their place. Of course, Alex was just as clumsy now, if not more because of how dark it was. Eventually he had to settle on laying a hand on Yin's shoulder to help himself along, and since the other boil never raised a complaint, he never let go.
"Yes." He whispered back, "And we can get team mates back that have been captured by tagging them out, though I imagine the prison will be well gaurded so...might just be best to try and find the skull, get it back to our own side, and finish the game off." He answered
And then he was suddenly pushed up against a tree with a hand over his mouth. Under different circumstances it might have been a bit...exciting. As it was, it was just mildly alarming. How had Yin gotten him in this position so quickly? As Yin leaned in close, Alex had a moment to wonder what the jack was going on, but then the other boil was whispering to him, and realization hit, and he managed to relax. Well...mostly.
He nodded his head a little, confirming that it was an enemy and that they should try to avoid her.
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Posted: Wed Mar 14, 2012 1:24 am
Yin nodded and backed up, looking out for the ghoul. Carefully he led Alexander in a wide path around her, feeling the cold hand once again return to his shoulder. War games. They made a good pair for them. They were about to try to turn back in the direction that they had initially been headed in when he caught sight of a shirtless boil. Two zombies? So close? They had to be getting close. He motioned to Alexander and then tried to creep forward silently, wincing each time Alexander stepped on something.
Finally they managed to make it to a rather secluded spot, with no one around so far as Yin could tell. "What is the plan?" he whispered. "What good hiding place would be around here? Do we need to separate?" He had no idea of where to begin looking. So far they had avoided two enemies, but that luck could probably not hold out forever. He needed to get his hands on the skull, then he could worry about moving it quickly.
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Posted: Wed Mar 14, 2012 1:35 am
Alex was finally able to move away from the tree as Yin released him, but secured his hand on the weremantis's shoulder again to be led around. Unfortunately he still snapped the odd twig or stumbled across the odd root poking out of the ground, but somehow he managed to not get caught.
Eventually they stopped, and if the two zomboils who had been standing together not that far off were any indication, they were fairly close to where they needed to be to find the skull.
"It's probably either up in a tree, like we did with ours, or possibly hidden in a hallow somewhere. I really think you might be better off going on your own now. I'm just likely to make too much noise and get caught, or slow you down." He shrugged, knowing it was true.
"I can look around here, anyways, but I have a feeling what we're looking for will be just beyond those two that we just saw." He stopped whispering for a moment, cocking his head to the side as though he could here something. Slowly, he crouched down, picking up something from the ground (a rock) and flinging it out into the bush, away from them and back towards where they had come from. He listened to the noise it made when landing with a satisfied grin, suddenly figuring out what he could do to help Yin out.
"Okay, so how about I just keep doing that to cause a distraction? It'll give you a better chance of not getting caught if they're all over here looking for me."
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Posted: Wed Mar 14, 2012 2:22 am
Yin nodded, absorbing his words. Tree, hollow. Something hidden. And going on his own...made sense. Alexander was right about that much. This was just a game, so he began to edge away. He actually grinned when the object that Alexander had thrown skipped into a bush. Trust Alexander to think of something like that. There was not a moment to lose. He crept through the forest, waiting for the zomboil's to finally start toward the noise before making his way around them. In the distance he could make out the faintest hint of something pale colored. Another zombie. This had to be the center of their domain.
It took time, and he could hear the commotion that Alexander was making. But then he noticed that a piece of bark on one tree did not quite match. He moved to it and immediately noticed that it certainly did not fit, and the trunk was rotted out. He reached in and pulled out the skull. So, not quite a severed head, but still decapitated. He tucked it firmly into his arm and began to creep back the way that he had come. Unfortunately there were zombies on either side that he did not want to dip towards, and the only other option was a small clearing.
He was halfway across when the shout went up. Well, a loud, howling moan of shock and rage. It set his teeth on edge and he darted forward, relying on his speed. He knew the general area that they had come from at least, but there was no time to track now. The purple-shirted ghoul came toward him and he had to swerve, getting off track and near another zombie that was suddenly right in front of him. He skidded to a halt and rolled to the side, rotted flesh touching empty air where he had just been.
His roll ended with him in a crouch and he was off again, hoping he was still headed back to his team. Though he really had no idea where their territory was to even stop running.
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Posted: Wed Mar 14, 2012 10:48 am
Alex stayed behind as Yin moved off into the trees. He kept himself hidden as best as a just over 6 foot tall zombie with very noticeable white hair could, and tried to make noise to distract the other zombies in the area by throwing sticks and rocks out into the trees as far away from himself and from Yin as he possibly could.
He knew that, eventually, they were going to catch on and then he would likely be captured, since he really had no back up plan whatsoever. In fact, his and Yin's plan wasn't so great either, since they didn't bother trying to set up a meeting place or a time frame before the weremantis took off in search of the skull.
As the sounds of somebody approaching caught Alex's ears, he turned to find himself backed up against a tree. He knew that he could probably climb it, as his natural ability did have it's uses. The question was, could he climb it fast enough to not be seen and remain hidden in the branches? Well, only one way to find out. He grabbed a hold of the tree with his hands and dug in, his fingers piercing through the bark. He then scrabbled for purchase with his feet, his skeletal toes actually doing him a favor for once as they easily found small crevices in the bark to wedge into. He then slowly and very meticulously hauled himself up into the tree until he was high enough to sit, albeit a little uncomfortably, in a cluster of branches that he hoped hid him from view.
It seemed he'd done this just in time, as the two guards that he had been trying to keep away from Yin wandered past not to far off from where Alex had been hiding. He had to stay incredibly still, and quiet, which was no problem for the zomboil when he didn't need to move. Some sudden shouting in the distance had his two cousins looking at each other, then moving quickly back through the trees, and Alex stood up a bit, craning his neck to try and see what was going on.
Was that....? Yin? Running through the forest and back the way they came with something tucked under his arm? Alex grinned, but had no way of getting out of the tree or moving fast enough to help the other boil out. A sudden snapping of twigs caught Alex's attention, and his eyes landed on...
"Hey dad!" He hissed, to the older large and broad zombie who was approaching, almost silently. His dad looked up, startled to see Alex up in a tree of all things.
"How did you...." He shook his head, eyes closing as though thinking about it was just too painful to even try. "Aren't you supposed to be gaurding?"
"Well...we pretty much captured everyone they sent to get the skull so we thought we'd come and help you out a bit. I think Yin captured the skull, anyways. He went that way." He pointed, "And was being followed pretty closely by the other team. I'm sure he could outdistance them, but I'm not so sure he knows where he's going. Mind going to give him a hand, if you can find him?" He asked, and his dad nodded in reply before slipping silently back off into the trees.
With a sigh, Alex started making his way back down the tree again, which took him ages to do, and then began making his way back towards his own teams territory, in his usual painfully slow manner, made even more so by the darkness and the treacherous forest floor.
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Posted: Wed Mar 14, 2012 11:24 am
It was easy to outrun members of the horde. But they had kept a few guards scattered through the forest, and he had to dodge those that remained. Ahead of him he could see a ghoul, and he had no idea which team she was on. Had he made it back or?
Not knowing, and not planning on stopping long enough to find out, he changed his direction slightly. He was just about to try to straighten back to the path when...were those lights up ahead? He found himself emerging from the forest near the house so...not technically anyone's territory. He tried to stay within the tree line, not knowing what the rules were, and walked up until he found the place where they had entered the forest at. There had been so many zombies that the path was evident and he headed back into the woods.
The weremantis slowed down a bit until he was no longer breathing heavily and just kept moving until he saw a boil. A boil with his shirt on. That looked somewhat familiar. He did not approach but kept a fair distance, just in case it was a trap. "Excuse me, where do I take this?"
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Posted: Wed Mar 14, 2012 12:13 pm
Yin might have been all over the place in that forest, but Alex, having no gaurds coming after him, was able to follow a straight path back to his teams territory. It still took him forever to get there, but in the end he made it back to his teams side and started back towards the prison, with absolutely no idea where Yin had gone or whether or not he'd been captured. He figured if he did make it back, he would have headed towards the prison and the guards as well, so Alex decided that would be the best place to start looking.
Meanwhile, the shirted zombie that Yin was approaching was indeed somebody on his own team. Michael, who was one of Alex's cousins that Yin had met on a few occasions now, gaped at the skull in Yin's hands. "That..you go that from the other team's territory? Wait, weren't you supposed to be gaurding or something? Never mind! You won the game for us!" He grinned, and then started yelling, cupping his hands around his mouth.
"HEY GUYS! GAME OVER! WE GOT THE SEVERED HEAD!" before turning back to Yin.
"Lets just take it to the yard in front of the house. Everyone will meet back there now...Unless you want to go and find Alex? I have no idea where he is though."
Thankfully, Alex could hear the shouting, and was backtracking now towards the house again, having made it perhaps half way through the territory towards the prisoners area when the yelling caught his attention. All of this walking around was becoming quite tedious, and he was about ready for the game to be over now, however fun it had been.
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Posted: Wed Mar 14, 2012 12:48 pm
Apparently zombies were a rather happy, if Michael's face was any indication. "Oh no, I really did very little," he said, slightly flustered. "Here, you had better take this." The zomboil started to protest but Yin was already passing the skull over to him, putting it in his hands before he could really resist.
Did he want to go find Alexander? It would be unnecessary now that the game was over, and he did not want to get lost in the dark forest again. He took off his goggles, letting them bounce to their normal place. "If you do not mind I shall follow you out of the forest. I am sure that Alexander can find his own way out."
Michael shrugged. "Alright. Jack, I bet Justin is going to be pissed." He grinned even more at the thought. Yin was simply happy that Michael moved a bit faster than Alexander, which meant that it did not take them to reach the edge of the forest where some zombies had already begun to emerge, headed to the open yard.
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Posted: Thu Mar 15, 2012 1:16 am
Alex stumbled out of the bush just in time to see that Yin and his cousin, Michael were walking together out of the forest as well. He hailed them with a happy wave before shambling his way towards them. He likely had bits of bark, leaves, twigs and dirt in his hair and attached to his clothes, but he wasn't really too bothered.
"You got it, then?" He said, rather excitedly as he finally approached the duo.
"Ya, he got it! This is some friend you brought home, Alex. Are all non-zombies like this?" His cousin asked, looking more then a little awestruck.
Alex just shrugged. "Well...Yin's not really like anybody else I've met." He gave the weremantis a smile. A special smile. He'd get these more frequently as time went on.
"Soooo, what did you think of the game, Yin? Did you have fun at least?" Alexander said happily, glancing around the yard to make sure everybody who was supposed to be coming back from the forest, was. He saw his mom and dad and two siblings. Nathaniel still looked incredibly pissed off, and was shooting glares towards them, but Alex just gave him a cheery smile and a wave, knowing that would upset the little -or big, as it was- brat, all the more.
He didn't see his cousin Justin anywhere, however, and idly wondered if the other zomboil had gotten too drunk to find his way back to the yard yet.
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Posted: Thu Mar 15, 2012 1:44 am
Yin was rather happy about that fact, if the zomboil had met another mantodae he would have been worried. And Alexander was staring at him and smiling. Just at him. So he tried to look happy as well. "The game was quite invigorating, though I certainly made mistakes. Perhaps if we play again I shall not get lost this time."
This was all well and good but he was noticing something fairly disturbing. A fairly good number of zombies were beginning to lurch and creep toward them from quite a few different directions. "I think that they wish to see the skull Michael. Perhaps you should go show it to them?" Attempting to sacrifice one of the cousins? Naturally. But he could just feel the eyes on him, and it was disconcerting really. Too many focused on him. If Michael would just take the skull forward...
"Nah, you captured it, you should show it off!" The zomboil was shoving the skull into Yin's hands and if he had not been before now he was now the center of attention.
So he tried the pass the skull over to Alexander.
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Posted: Thu Mar 15, 2012 1:55 am
Alexander grinned happily, "I don't think you made many mistakes at all. You captured more prisoners then anybody else and you found the skull. That's pretty damned impressive Yin."
Alex also noticed that there were several members of his family eyeing the three of them curiously, probably waiting to see the skull that Yin had captured. He wasn't quite sure what the weremantis was waiting for...until he remembered that Yin probably didn't really want a repeat of the day before when he first met the family, or of earlier in the day during the celebratory team huddle after bruteball.
So, when Yin began shoving the skull into Alex's hands, the zomboil just took it, giving the weremantis a reassuring look. "It's getting late, Yin. Why don't you go upstairs and check on...uh..whatever it is you caught earlier that's sitting in the kennel. If you're ready to go to bed, of course. If not, I'm sure we can find something to do until you are."
Alex really had no idea how much sleep a non-undead required, and thus assumed that once it was dark, and fairly late into the evening, anyone would be tired.
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