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Things had gotten a little... hectic... for Super Sailor Tsui, Senshi of Tigers and apparently mass murderer of youma everywhere. She was simply fed up with everything on Earth: the war that seemed to be going no where, her enemies that didn't seem as bad as they were though she was unable to look past the ambush still, and worst of all was the fact that, simply put, she was failing in school. That was the worst simply because she knew she SHOULD have cared about her civilian life, but she didn't. She couldn't care. Not when everything else about being a Senshi was so much more important.

So, she decided that it was time to simply leave this gay Earth, and take to the stars once more. It had been awhile since she visited her home world, and was rudely KICKED OUT of it too, and this time, she was determined to get into that temple. Somehow. "What did that voice say? Earn my stripes? Sear them into my very soul? What does that even mean?!"

She couldn't figure it out, and she hadn't tried to since the incident. She had far too many other things to worry about, but no more. For now, her home world needed more investigating, and she knew that she couldn't do it alone. She owed it to Eternal Sailor Kallichore to bring her along, and in truth, it couldn't hurt to bring her friend along. Maybe she can straighten things up for her again...

She sent the text and waited eagerly on their favorite meeting place, the rooftop where they sparred many moons ago. She missed Kallichore greatly, and now, she wanted her advice on how to proceed in this messed up war they were in.

The moment Kallichore arrived, all of Tsui's concerns were gone, and she held nothing back when she approached her friend and opened her arms to give her friend a hug. Tsui may have been prideful, but she had little shame in displaying her affection to Kallichore. Who the hell would think ill of her, or dare to say anything against it and NOT risk having their face punched in? No one... that's who.

"Trust me, I don't think we'll have much use for pens or paper where we're doing. Though we might have to use leaves, if we need to use the bathroom..." Tsui said with a grin, hoping it'd be enough to hide any of the lingering concern that might have been present before Kallichore arrived. "As we kind of expected, it's a jungle up there. Trees, and branches, and loud as heck with all the birds and the bugs."

There was so much she wanted to tell Kallichore, but most of all, it was the tiger she chased, and the temple. Everything else could have waited until they got there. "I ran into this one tiger... it was huge, much bigger than the ones here at the zoo. I followed it to this temple, but before I could even GET there, I think my own home kicked me out."

She couldn't hide the slight anger in her voice, and the way she huffed made it obvious that she still hadn't forgiven her home for evicting her so soon. "The nerve of Tsui, kicking me out... maybe the two of us can figure it out?"

"I don't know why my star would kick me out," Tsui said, not ashamed to show Kallichore her frustration, and one could tell that it REALLY grinded on her nerves with how she clenched her fists and the stance she took. She even stomped a foot on the rooftop, the tuffs of fur on her boots doing little to distract how menacing she might have looked. "But I heard a voice, and it told me not to come back... not until the stripes have been seared into my very soul, or something cryptic like that."

Her anger was quickly dissipated when Kallichore made the Scooby Doo reference, though, and if anything, having Kallichore come up with her was definitely a relief, more than it probably should have been. Tsui wanted to leave... everything, really. Earth, the Dark Mirror Court and the Negaverse, even the White Moon Court, school... family life, including her unborn baby brother or sister. She just wanted to get away from it all, and if retreating to her troll of a homeworld was the ticket, then it was time to go.

She grabbed her cellphone and lifted it into the air, as though she were trying to get a signal. When Kallichore said she was ready, she closed her eyes and tried to concentrate, homing in on Tsui and reaching out to it. The teleportation, if that's what it was called, was just as swift as it had been previously with Kallichore and her recent visit, and when she felt solid ground beneath her feet, she opened her eyes and looked to her friend to make sure that she had done it right. This was her first attempt bringing someone else, though she was certain that it wouldn't be her last...

"Well, what do you think?" Tsui asked, waving an arm around and showing Kallichore the luscious, wild jungle that was her home. The trees were thick and heavy with leaves and other foliage, with vines hanging from them, almost tempting to climb up and see what the world might have looked like from atop the trees. It still rung 'Temple of Doom' to Tsui, but in a sense, she was very proud of her home, of Tsui. Despite its rude eviction... "I bet this jungle goes on forever, though... so it'd be best if we stuck together."

Not to mention there was that one tiger... though now, Tsui wasn't sure if it was truly there, or a figment of her imagination. Maybe it was an illusion caused by her planet? Either way, she didn't want to test the theory of it was real by throwing her friend at it...

Tsui was no genius. She barely paid attention in class, assuming she ever went to class to begin with, and even then, she didn't retain information that she found to be boring all that well. Part of her just wanted to drop out of school and become a full time Senshi, but that was neither here nor there. She mused, "Do tigers even live in South America? I thought they lived in Asia..."

She should have known this, given that she was the god-damn Senshi of Tigers, but she was pretty certain that tigers resided in Asia and perhaps some parts of the middle east. Or rather, they did. It depressed her still to know that the tiger that her family name was derived from, the Caspian, was extinct... but there was nothing she could do about that. She moved to one of the trees and pulled at the vines, prepared for either birds or insects to take the air, or maybe even a snake to fall down on them. It was thick, heavy, but she could barely see the skies above them through the foliage. "Yeah, which makes me wonder why my home seems filled to the brim with life, but other homes aren't so lucky. The worst thing that happened here, by the looks of it, is that the gardener abandoned his or her duty."

Tsui silently hoped that SHE wasn't said gardener... she was no good with pruning or the sort, and given how many creatures likely lurked in these jungles, she'd need to have eyes on the back of her head. Speaking of predators and lurking, she especially kept her eyes peeled for her fuzzy 'friend', curious if he was truly there after all or if it was a figment caused by her star. Either way, she was eager to see if he'd appear, if only to lure her back towards the spot where she saw the temple. Otherwise, Tsui hated to admit that she wasn't sure where to start. "Alright, so, look for any broken branches or a pathway... or if you spot a really huge tiger, follow him. That's how I found the temple last time."

The 'tiger' arrived fairly quickly the last time... would having a friend scare it away? A tiger THAT big? Unlikely! The two of them could have ridden on its back if that was the case...

"Maybe the people of the past knew better than to wonder into the woods with giant tigers roaming around." Tsui said, plucking a leaf off the vine and giving it a sniff, though she wasn't sure why she did it. Maybe she was trying to pretend that she was an explorer and had done it for 'scientific' reasons, but in truth, she just wanted something to crumble, to alleviate the tension within her. What if she was rejected again, with Kallichore there to see it? What if her friend got stranded here... what if her FRIEND was accepted and she wasn't? No, that would have made her mad, but thankfully, Kallichore seemed to have been doing a better job at investigating their surroundings than she had. She looked in the direction that Kallichore pointed and moved to investigate. "Hm... it doesn't seem too familiar, but then again, I had my eyes trained on the tiger, not so much the surroundings."

What else could they do but follow the trail? If it was the right trail, then they got to the temple all the sooner (and less hair-raising than the last time). If they were wrong, maybe it'd lead to someplace new to explore? Or... a tiger's belly. Either way, Tsui was never the type to allow the consequences to prevent her from moving forward, as foolish as that notion might have been. Besides, she had Kallichore with her... how could she feel any safer than she did now?

"Let's go... maybe the tiger I was chasing felt generous and left a trail for us to follow," Tsui said, motioning for her friend to follow her and flashing her a confident smile. She didn't want Kallichore to think she was nervous... why SHOULD she feel nervous when returning home? Except large, man-eating tigers and the possibility of being kicked out of her homeworld again, that is... "Stay alert, too... tigers are excellent creatures of stealth, though... I half wonder why I didn't learn a thing or two from them."

Yes, cracking a joke, especially about herself, was definitely an outward sign of her nervousness, though Tsui would likely NEVER admit to it.

Tsui was ashamed to admit that she was paying far more attention to the scenery and keeping her eyes peeled for any sign of the tiger that she only caught part of Kallichore's encouragement. She appreciated the compliment, though she knew Kallichore meant every word of it, and that was enough to give the Tiger senshi the warm fuzzies. She allowed her ego to swell, for a moment, speaking up just as Kallichore seemed to be having trouble with the vines all around her. "One thing I could learn from then is stealth... king of the jungle and I go charging around like a damned elephant!"

Though, from what she recalled, elephants were a lot stealthier than one would think. Her train of thought was derailed when she heard Kallichore's shout, and she turned around, prepared to laugh though the sound was cut short when she swore she saw the vines constricting and moving. She moved to help her friend, not even bothering to hide her surprise and she started tugging at the vines. "Kalli, how the hell did you manage to get into that?"

Not that she was meaning to throw any blame onto her friend, merely trying to lighten up the situation with a harmless jab. She yanked and tugged, trying to loop pieces around and when that didn't seem to be working well, she tried tearing them with her bare hands. She was so focused on freeing Kallichore from this predicament that she didn't notice how the bushes behind her moved, nor how a pair of bright, blue eyes shown through the darkness of the foliage that hide the great beast. "Stop struggling... I think I can cut this with me teeth if I need to!"

"I wouldn't know... spiders aren't normally allowed in my apartment and are killed on sight!" Tsui admitted, stepping back and waiting for Kallichore to stop her struggling entirely before considering how best to free her friend from this predicament. She tried not to laugh; if she was stuck in the same predicament, she wouldn't have appreciated the humor (perhaps a few weeks from now, but at the moment laughing wouldn't do either of them much good). Finally, her friend was still, if not upside down, and Tsui gave one of the vines a tug to test its sturdiness. "You got yourself stuck in there real bad... gah, too bad Senshi don't use weapons, otherwise getting you down would be a LOT easier!"

She mused for a moment, her thoughts derailed when she thought she heard a twig snapping behind her. She spun around, fists curled into tight balls and looking into the bushes to see if she could find the source of the noise. Of all the times for the tiger to be back, why now? Why now when her friend needed her help? She didn't see it immediately, but she was certain that it was there, lurking. "Crap! Kallichore, did you hear that? I think that tiger is back..."

She could almost feel its eyes on them, as she scanned the forest for any sign of it. Should she try fighting off the tiger, or free her friend first? "Do you see it?"

Tsui knew that Kallichore was more or less trying to lighten the mood, but she couldn't bring herself to play along, not this time. The tiger did not move from its spot, but the growl that it emitted warned her that it wasn't going to stay still for much longer. This was definitely a bad situation to be in, and Tsui was so distressed from recent events that she didn't appreciate it. She snapped at Kallichore, before taking her defensive position in front of the beast, keeping her golden eyes locked on its own icy blue one. "I'm not tellin' your family anything, because I'm not going to let anything happen to you!"

The tiger gave a snort and moved closer to them but did not completely reveal itself just yet. And if anything, it caused Tsui to step forward and challenge it, and the same demanding tone from her last visit took her voice as she shouted. "Here that? This is my home... and this is MY guest! So, you WILL back off! Or else!"

She motioned her arms before her and was preparing to summon her white aura to strike, should the beast dare to come any closer. She had taken on far stronger youma and even stronger enemies, and she was NOT going to allow a tiger, whom of which she felt that she had some sort of command over as being the Senshi of that sphere, attack her or her friend. And the tiger seemed... amused by her display. It gave a snort, followed by a beastly roar, and then, without much warning, simply shook its fuzzy head and faded back into the jungle. Tsui wasn't sure what to think, but she could not fight the sense of pride that began to swell within her chest. "Yeah... y-yeah, I thought so! This is MY home!"

Tsui looked back at Kallichore, completely dropping her guard and moving to help her friend down. "See... told you no one was going to hurt you..."

Eyes of various color sprout out around the jungle, blue, yellow and orange, and the chorus of snarls and growls warned Tsui that she might have spoken too soon. She spoke softly to Kallichore, too afraid to admit that she didn't want to look around to see just how many there were. "Um... Kalli... Tigers aren't pack animals, right?"