|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 Posted: Wed Jun 09, 2010 2:48 pm
 Akeakamai sniffed about in the tall grass just outside the valley where she lived, though even she didn't know exactly what she was trying to smell. One thing she did know was that this grass was much taller than she was, and so every so often she could be seen jumping straight up as high as she could, her head poking up over the top of the grass for just a moment before she vanished once again, unable to see.
"What has made this grass so long?" She panted, quickly tiring from her bouncing. "The grass in the valley is short, but this..." She swatted at the grass playfully with her paw. "In the way, to say the least. Yup." She plopped her brown rump down on the ground and wagged her tail, content to stare up at the sky for the moment while she caught her breath. She giggled to herself as she remembered her mother's story about when she and her father first met, how he seemed to speak to the clouds sometimes.
"Father is such a silly. Silly is fun, though." She nodded, still staring up at the clouds. "Yes, fun. Mother is fun too, but mostly when father is around. Maybe father is the source of fun? How interesting..." She trailed off dreamily, suddenly distracted by a cloud that was rather large at the front and seemed to be moving so fast that the back end could not keep up, trailing behind in little wisps.
"Slow down, cloud!" She called playfully, "You're leaving yourself behind!"
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Wed Jun 09, 2010 4:21 pm
 Ambling down from the highlands of his home, Wailawa wandered in a lopsided pattern, watching his feet intently. He'd been given mismatched paws by his parents, some green some white, some with markings, some without. It was most disorienting, and he'd discovered that if he concentrated on them while walking, he'd forget which was which, and soon they'd jumble together and he'd go rollicking back and forth until he fell over. It made for a swell entertainment, except when he landed on something prickly.
But more importantly, he'd seen his only sister come down this way, and he'd followed her to share a vital bit of information that he'd uncovered. It had shocked him, shocked him right down to his very core, and he had to tell someone or he'd just burst! Except... it had gone right out of his head with the next butterfly he saw, and now it was just a footprint in his mind, nagging at him. Maybe if he caught up with her, it would come to him again.
Trying not to look at his feet so he wouldn't keel over, Wailawa sniffed at the grasses, trying to pick up his sister's scent. But there was no need, for soon he heard her voice a short ways off. Gleeful, he bounded towards the sound, running blind in the tall grass, and soon he had to come up short or risk colliding with her. He instinctively pulled an acrobatic leap over her that would've been fancy if he'd done it on purpose, then failed the landing and flopped down with splaying of limbs.
He sniffed, and gazed up at her solemnly. "Heya Yakeak...keakakek..." he occasionally had trouble with longer words. He couldn't get his own name right five out of ten. "...Kamai," he finished lamely. "Whatcha doin'?"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Jun 10, 2010 9:00 am
The sudden appearance of her brother over head caused Akeakamai to flinch and yelp softly in surprise. Once she saw that it was her bright brother, she calmed down a bit, laughing softly to try to cover up her slight panic. Who could truly blame her, though? A flying hyena? That was a rather frightening thought.
"Just thinking." She smirked as he tried to pronounce her name. She too had trouble with unusual names sometimes, but to cover it up she simply did what her father did and gave them some other name, followed by their actual name. Giving her mouth a running start, so to speak, helped her. "And talking to the clouds, bright brother Wailawa. What are you doing?" She giggled, staring down at him with a broad grin.
"You know, aside from landing all strange and ending up on your back." She continued to laugh, trying her best to hold it back but failing. She couldn't help it though, it was just so funny! In a matter of moments she was on the ground with him, giggling incessantly and uncontrollably, rolling from one side to the other.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Jun 10, 2010 10:47 am
Picking himself up gingerly, Wailawa was going to answer her question, but got distracted by her sudden giggling fit. He quirked a head, watching her curiously. Was talking to clouds really that funny? He glanced up at them for a long moment, but if there was humor in the sky, it was beyond his grasping. He shrugged mentally, unconcerned. A lot of things tended to sail over his head, like half the things adults said. He was used to it.
"I was..." he paused. He'd forgotten what question he was answering. She'd asked him something, hadn't she? He absently stared at his feet, tracing the lines with his eyes. "D'you ever really look at your paws?" he asked suddenly, and spread out one foot, separating out the toes as much as he could. "We've got four, and food has four, 'cept food has hard feet and no toes. Why do we have four? I asked mama, she said we're quadera... kadro... kaddrie... petal. We've got four petals. 'Cause hyenas are like flowers, I guess."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Jun 10, 2010 3:04 pm
"My paws?" Mai got to her feet, still giggling slightly under her breath, "What 'bout them?" She stood with her legs wide, looking at one after the other. Three of them were brown, while one was a creamy white color with a bit of brown on the tops of the toes. She had never noticed before, but it was as if her foot mark belonged on her brother instead of her.
"Petals?" She laughed, "That sounds so silly, did mother really tell you that?" She tilted her head to one side, still glancing between her feet and those of her bright brother. "Maybe she was playing a joke on you?"
Still, she couldn't help but wonder why their food had hard feet without toes. Her brother made a good point. "Maybe they used to have toes... And then they got stuck in rocks." She smirked at the thought of a gazelle with toes, "Or, uh... I dunno, maybe we are like flowers. But I've never seen a flower move before, and I can't quite figure out which part of them is their feet." She frowned, concentrating to try to remember what her mother had told her.
"Yeah, I used to think it was the roots but then mother said that they eat through their roots, so maybe... The roots are like our tummies." She looked around, trying to spot a flower that they could examine, but there were none. At least, none that she could see past this tall grass. "Maybe flowers keep their feet up like this?" She rolled onto her back and stuck her paws in the air, "Maybe petals are their feet."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Jun 11, 2010 3:05 am
"Nuh uh, that's what she said, she said we had petals," Wailawa insisted, but doubt was creeping in. Was mama playing a joke on him? Would he have been able to tell if she had? Akeakamai would probably recognize it far better than he. So he filed that bit of info away for later, along with her talk about the roots being where flowers eat. He hadn't known that. Seems there was a lot in this world he didn't know.
Well, that was the point, wasn't it? Mama and grampa Kafil were always talking about how the pack collected knowledge and stories. He'd taken that in with pride and a sense of responsibility. Each bit of news about the world was important, and if he knew something, it made him a useful carrier of Knowledge. He was doing his duty for the pack. That made him very happy. Unfortunately, he seemed to keep dropping the Knoweldge before he could give it to someone else.
He sniffed at the nearest flowers skeptically. "Doesn't smell like feet," he mused. With a grin, he lolloped over to his sister and snuffled at her paws dangling up in the air. "Doesn't smell like flowers," he laughed. "Smells like sister." He tried to turn his head to face the same direction as her, and ended up flopping over next to her on his back. "Why would flowers eat with their roots, anywayayay? There's nothin' to eat in the ground, just dirt."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sat Jun 12, 2010 5:10 pm
"Maybe petals can mean more than one thing." She shrugged, wiggling her toes. "Some words mean a bunch of stuff." She couldn't think of why petals could mean feet, but not everything had to make sense. Unfortunately.
She giggled at her brother, partly because he was funny and partly because his nose tickled her feet. "Of course not, bright brother Wailawa." She snickered, "I mean, not even all flowers smell the same. Lotsa different smells all over the place." She stood up, shaking the dust off her fur and sniffing the air.
"I wonder how mother and all the other adults got so good at smelling anyways. They can smell food from far away, but I can't even tell them all apart yet. They get all jumbled up in the air. Oh yes, food! She had nearly forgotten about her brother's comment about flowers eating from their roots.
"Maybe they eat bugs." She made an odd face at the idea. Bugs were gross. "They could suck them up through their roots, I guess. All kinds of creepy crawlies they could eat with their tummy-toes."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Wed Jul 14, 2010 7:53 am
Now very curious about the inner workings of flowers, Wailawa sniffed at the ones nearest to him, of which there was quite a variety. He couldn't distinguish one from the other, though, they all just smelled sweet. Maybe his sister was right, and adults were much better at this sort of thing. He wondered if he'd get better at it with age.
Gripping the nearest flower low down on the stem with his teeth, he labored to pull the roots out from the ground, and succeeded in getting maybe half of them. "They look so tiny," he wondered aloud. "Like hairs or somethin'." There was a tiny bulb among the roots, and he gleefully pointed at it. "Look, lookit, that must be the mouth or somethin'. Maybe it opens up like a flower bud, and, and when there's a bug, it goes, 'OMPH', and eats it up!"
Delighted with this idea, he bounded around his sister, making 'omph' noises and snapping his jaws. He tried shoving his nose into the dirt and sticking his hind feet up in the air to be the flowers, but that only left him tumbling over backwards with a mouthful of soil. "Blegh."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Jul 15, 2010 6:49 pm
Mai eyed the roots curiously. She had never really looked at them that closely, but her brother was right. They looked like hairs. "Maybe plants have all their body parts all in one spot, since they're so small. I mean, they have mouths and feet and hairs all right there." She poked the roots gently with her paw. "You're probably right, but I wonder how it knows I'm not a bug." It probably would have tried to eat her toes if it had. Maybe plants were smarter than she gave them credit for.
"Wailawa!" She jumped as he tumbled on the ground with dirt in his mouth, completely unaware of what he was trying to accomplish. "You okay?" She asked, trying her best not to giggle too much until she was sure her brother was not hurt. "Did the plant make ya crazy or something?" She had heard that some plants had odd powers if you ate them or smelled them. Maybe she shouldn't go around sniffing flowers too much after all.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Jul 16, 2010 11:01 am
Spitting out the dirt, Wailawa stood and shook himself off. His spirits weren't ruffled, though, and he bounded about once again. "Nah, I'm alright sis." To demonstrate, he made a high leap in the air to show off, and wagged his tail at his sister, tongue wagging. He wasn't sure what she was talking about, with plants making people crazy, but it sounded like a swell idea for a game.
Snapping up the flower he'd unearthed, he walked play menacingly towards Akeakamai, waving the rootbulb like a toy weapon. "Rrr," he mouthed around the stem, "Ebil plant 'as taken over mah mind, and commands I ta attack tha sister! Plant's gonna eatcha all up!" He worried she might take him too seriously though, despite the absurdity of the plot. So he winked dramatically and whispered "I'm just playing, kkkKamai."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sun Jul 18, 2010 8:22 pm
"That's..." Mai didn't finish her sentence, intending on telling her brother that it was good that he was not hurt, but his odd behavior left her speechless. She was completely unsure if he was being serious about the plant or not, at least at first. She winked back at Wailawa and scurried a short distance away from him, pretending to be terrified.
"Oh no, the evil plant is controlling my brother!" She ran in circles, unsure of how to proceed until she saw yet another flower nearby. Maybe....
She snapped up the other flower in her jaws and gave her brother a wide-eyed, blank stare. "You can't eat meh now!" She said in a monotone voice, "I'm one o' tha plant's minions too." She walked stiff-legged back toward her brother, as if she was being controlled. "We plants gonna take over the world!"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sun Jul 18, 2010 8:38 pm
Watching his sister with concern that she might actually be scared, he grinned around the stem as he saw her take up the game as well. He nearly dropped the flower for snickering at her awkward "mind controlled" steps, which looked so comical. He tried it out too, holding his head stiff as well and walking jerkingly with his eyes straight forward. "Ebil... plants... take over the world..." he intoned.
Dropping the plant, he pretended to regain his own mind, and cowered away from the pitiful unearthed plant like it was a terrible threat. "No, no plant master, don't make me take over the world!" But the plant's will was too strong, and soon he picked it up again and resumed the monotone voice. "Come sister, we'll make a world where flowers are kings. And, and then they'll, um, they'll grow as tall as trees and go 'rahr!' and they'll force all the 'yenas to find bugs for them to eat all the time. And mama will be all 'Oh no, save us 'Lawa!'"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sun Jul 18, 2010 8:48 pm
"Come back to us, Wailawa." She said as he dropped the flower and moved away from it. "Come back to the flower empire. Obey the will of the plants!" She smiled as he picked up the flower again and joined her once more in their plant game.
"Yes, all hail the flowers! We must find a better place for our plant masters to live so that we may bring them bugs and so they can take over more minds." She walked alongside her brother. "Mama will love the plants too. Everyone loves the plants." She attempted to keep herself from bursting out laughing and ruining their game, but it was a struggle. Every once in a while a giggle tried to escape from her and she held it back, resulting in an odd snorting noise instead.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sun Jul 18, 2010 8:57 pm
"Yesss, love the plants..." Wailawa repeated, trying to cross his eyes for added effect, but only making himself dizzy. "Ow. We must make the other 'yenas love the plants too. We'll go, "Smell the flower mama," and she'll go, "Oh that flower smells nice oh no I am mind controlled now!" At her suggestion, he looked around for somewhere for the plants to live. What would be a good place for a plant to live, anyway?
The logical choice for him was the pack's cave homes. He felt at home there, so why wouldn't a flower? It was snug and warm with other bodies, and it protected from the rain and the sun when it got too hot. The concept that the weather might be desired by plants, rather than avoided, was totally lost on him. "We could take the flowers back to the pack caves, and put them back in the ground there and bring them bugs."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sun Jul 18, 2010 9:07 pm
"Good idea, brother." She said, heading back toward the dens with Wailawa at her side and the plant in her mouth. "We will bring our plant masters many bugs and tomorrow we can bring flowers to anyone we can and they'll be controlled too." She wagged her tail, continuing to hold back her giggles as they went.
They would go back to their den and Mai would put her "flower master" in the corner where she usually slept. It wouldn't take long for it to wilt, but for now Mai was completely oblivious to that fact, simply having fun with her brother. This had been a fun, if a little strange, adventure and even though they hadn't really figured anything out for sure about the plants, she had a whole set of new questions for her mother. She'd learn from this day, even if it wasn't directly.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
