|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 Posted: Sat Dec 18, 2010 12:21 am
 Aysu paced back and forth, back and forth near the center of the tribe. She couldn't help but be nervous about all the impending confrontations coming up. It was late at night, most of the tribe was getting tired and going to bed, but she and her siblings were awake.
The vixen whined and pulled her ears back. She loved Daddy, so much, but nothing had ever been the same since Daddy Kazuki and her other three siblings had gone off that so-called quest of Selene's. A quest to what? Kavi had been injured early in the mission and come back with a broken leg; he didn't know much about where any of the others were. And then Daddy Kazuki...
Aysu sighed. Why couldn't she stop thinking about these things? She wanted to find a mate, raise a family, be happy, but everywhere she looked these days reminded her of bad things.
They had to fix this. They were a family! Even Kavi...even if he did bring up his plan to Daddy, they were all going to love each other. She'd just keep reminding herself of that.
Dammit, where were Zuki and Daddy? Kavi sat a few feet from his sister, still except for his eyes, which followed her nervous movements. He was secretly anxious about tonight as well, but probably not as much as his sister. She was a peacekeeper, a mediator. If he had to, he would blow peace out of the water. If he had to.
He sighed to himself. He wasn't looking forard to any upcoming drama either, but these things needed to be talked about. He kept watching Aysu as they waited.
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sun Dec 19, 2010 10:08 pm
 Azuki couldn't help but roll her eyes as she spotted her siblings ahead of her; Aysu was pacing back and forth, worrying as always, while Kavi was just sitting there, watching her. He could be quite a jerk sometimes like that.
Chuffing lightly as she joined him, Zuki gently bumped hips with her brother. "C'mon, 's not nice to freak out, she's worried enough," Zuki murmured to him, crossing the few feet that separated them from Aysu.
"Hey," Zuki greeted easily, tail wagging slightly. "'S gonna be okay, eh?"
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sun Dec 19, 2010 11:21 pm
 It was so late, in fact, that Ari was heading back to the clearing in which he slept during the day. It hadn't been his choice to sleep so far away from the tribe grounds, actually--Kazuki was the one who had picked the spot. And even though Kazuki was gone, and nothing was keeping Ari there but the memories, still, day after day, he returned there to sleep, rather than stay in the caves with the rest of the tribe. Because memories were now all he had left of his mate.
He was brought up short by the presence of three unaccustomed, but not unfamiliar, figures in the middle of the tribe grounds. Azuki had been around quite a lot since her miraculous return, but Aysu and Kavi? He could hardly remember the last time he had seen his two children who still were with the tribe--perhaps back when Thea gave birth, he thought, although that was more than half a year ago now. But if they were happy living on the fringes of the tribe, who was he to stop them? Certainly some part of his family deserved happiness--if not him, then his children.
He approached slowly, as though worried he would scare them off. And perhaps he was, on some level--certainly, Aysu and Kavi seemed to want nothing to do with him, as far as he could tell, even though it hurt--even though he wished he could spend more time with them. But if they didn't want him around, the least he could do was give them their peace.
"Good evening, Zuki, Aysu, Kavi." The words seemed oddly formal--more suited to an elder speaking with new tribe members, rather than a father to his children. Was that what they had become, nothing more than mere strangers to each other? Ari wished he could say it wasn't so, but he couldn't; not even he could lie to himself that badly.
"How are you?" he asked, trying at a more casual conversation, at something that more suited their role as family. And failing. As usual.
Moon Fox, what will it take to fix us?, he prayed.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sun Dec 19, 2010 11:45 pm
Kavi blinked as Zuki chided him. He wasn't trying to freak Aysu out...
He grunted as she went over to Aysu and let them talk, scanning the area around them. The tribe was dead quiet, save for the hum of insects and the sounds of the early morning birds slowly waking up from their sleep.
And the sound of footsteps coming closer. Kavi sighed and then took in a deep breath; it was going to be okay.
Aysu was about to respond to her sister when Daddy walked up to the three of them. She inwardly sighed at his stiff greeting. She knew that with all the tension between them, she didn't deserve some heartfelt welcome from her father, but secretly she'd hoped for something...more. She had been practically out of sight for months and all she got was a "good evening"?
Well, she supposed it was partly her own doing. Still, she had to work to ignore the stinging feeling. "Hello, Dad," she mumbled, looking down at the ground. She wasn't avoiding his gaze out of anger; she just felt awkward fumbling around like this with her own father. Why did this all feel so fake?
Before she could give him a generic "we're fine" answer, Kavi cut into the conversation.
"We've been better, Father," Kavi greeted Ari cooly. What was the point in lying to him? All four of them were miserably ******** up at the moment, and more fake positive answers and avoiding the truth and all these stupid games they'd all been playing for months needed to end.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Mon Dec 20, 2010 11:36 pm
Azuki went over and nuzzled her father quickly, not having a problem breaking the touch barrier with him, even if her siblings did. Inwardly, she winced at the tone of Kavi's voice, but before Ari (or Aysu or Kavi) could keep talking, she looked up at their father and sighed softly.
"Before we start, Daddy, I just think we should tell you that...it's not your fault, okay? I mean, not just your fault. Everyone could have handled everything better, but we didn't, so there's no use howling over spilled blood." Maybe that wasn't the best metaphor, but she could work with it.
"So all that's left to do now is try to fix it, which is what we're here to talk to you about. The less you get defensive and the more you relax the better it'll go, Daddy, I promise." With another nuzzle to conclude her prelude, Azuki padded away from her father to lay down somewhere between the two sides of this war: she had walked into the middle of a battlefield when she came home, and it wasn't her war to fight. She would do anything to help her family, but until she absolutely had to she would not, would not pick a side, and they couldn't make her. She was there to play mediator, to make sure nobody got too angry or hurt--it wasn't her favorite role to play, but she could play it alright...she hoped.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Tue Dec 21, 2010 7:08 pm
The look Ari gave Kavi for his words was somewhere between surprised and incredulous. Been better? How could they? They were happy, and seemed to have accepted Kazuki's death far faster and far better than he had.
He nuzzled Zuki back when she approached, although he felt somewhat lost. What were they talking about? Did he really know so little about his own children?
He shouldn't be surprised that he didn't--they hardly spent any time together anymore. The last time they had really been together as a family was just before Kazuki and three of their children had been called off by the Moon Fox. They had only just grown up, Yuicha, Piko, and Ibuki, when they set out...he didn't know what had happened to them, except that they must be alive; the Moon Fox would certainly have told him if they had died, too.
But it was strange to think that he hardly knew the children who had stayed behind any better than their missing siblings. But if they were happy that way...
But were they? After first Kavi, and then Zuki's words...
"What do you mean, 'been better'?" He slowly approached Kavi, as though he were a rabbit that was prone to bolting, rather than his own son, someone he shouldn't have to be so wary of scaring off, wondering if perhaps there was something physically wrong.
But as he came closer, he could see that wasn't it--there were no injuries he could see, and belatedly he realized that if something had happened, Kavi would have gone to a shaman, not to Ari. He was getting tired if his thinking was this slow. But he could hardly go to bed now, with his children suddenly and unexpectedly--but not unwelcomedly--here in front of him.
"Did something happen? Kavi? Aysu? Zuki?" He was concerned for his children. And concerned about whatever was serious enough to have driven them to the middle of the tribe, and to him.
It however left him in the uncomfortable position of wondering whether he disliked this problem more for whatever it was doing to his children, or was grateful to it, for in a way bringing them back to him.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
