It was about midday, perfect time for a walk around the castle walls, i thought to myself.The sun was hot on my cloak, so I pulled back my hood and looked about. I was just outside of the castle. Green grass and trees were strewn about, and the sound of birds chirping filled the air. I decided to walk towards the right.
Right into a puddle. My foot was soaked. This isn't an awfully good start. But soon after walking I had found a dry clearing. Setting down my bag I figured this spot would be as good as any.
It took me a full 2 hours getting everything set up, as the tent I got from a sailor was quite worn and had to be jimmyrigged to stand up right. Now I just needed some food. I walked into the woods a short distance and waited beside a rather large tree. I had a plan.
I slowly leaked a small amount of gelled res into a puddle on the ground. Inside the puddle lay some acorns I had gathered. The res was thin, only enough to burn for a few seconds. I hid behind the tree and waited.
Nothing passed for 2 hours, but now I heard some rustling in the bushes on the other side of me and the tree. I turned and peeked my head out, keeping an eye on the acorns. The res was thick enough to stay in place, of this I was grateful. Suddenly, a squirrel jumped from the bushes and began to sniff about. The green res on the ground looked more like moss than anything else. It stepped onto it, and then jumped back. Sniffed it for a second, then walked back to the acorns. This time I could see another squirrel followed. I had two squirrels in my trap, damn my luck was good today.
I raised my hand sharply and flames engulfed to two squirrels. They tried to run but the air in their lungs was burned away and they were blinded by flames. After a few seconds the flames subsided to a smolder and I used my res to move the ash and remaining heat away from the two squirrels. They were hairless now and their skin a bit charred, but nowhere near cooked. I'll need a controlled fire, I said to myself as I gabbed them both, gutting them on the spot.
As I walked back to my clearing I gathered up some wood that was fallen from the surrounding trees. Collecting it all into a pile a few armslengths away from my tent I layed down a dense ball of gaseous, green res in the center of the wood and ignited it.
Within a half hour the squirrels were cooked, eaten and I had begun to whittle a small bird out of a knot of wood I had found. I used the grease from the squirrel meat as a varnish of sorts to make the wood look pretty. The wings were detached, and then popped into small sockets I made for them so they could be moved. The feet however were stationary. But the small bird was balanced, it could stand on it's own quite easily. I truly did enjoy making toys.
About an hour later I was wandering the outskirts of the clearing when a blackbird fell directly in front of me. It was alive, but it had a bolt stuck in its chest. I looked around quickly and saw no sign of anyone on their way. It must have been a stray shot. I was lucky enough to avoid it myself, I thought.
"Hmm" I reached into my pocked and pulled out the small wooden bird. "I can take away your misery little one." I said to the bird in a calm voice. I set the toy down next to the bird and grabbed a stick. Quickly I drew a circle around each of them and connected the two with a line. The standard animator's technique. I began to channel my energy into the transferring of the LP from the bird to the toy. It was a simple process for all I wanted to transfer was it's ability to flap it's wings at the request of the word 'Fly', and to stop when 'stop' was said. The whole process took only about 20 minutes. The bird was no longer in pain.
I dug a small grave next to the animation circles and buried the bird. The picking up the toy and holding it in my hand I said to it,
"Fly" and it's wings started to flap slowly.
"Stop" I commanded, and it did so.
I truly did enjoy making toys, i thought with a quick smirk as I walked back to my tent.
Placing my new toy away in my tent, I pulled out my lute and began to strum a simple beat. The sounds were something soft like, 'high high low high low low high'. I began to hum along.
After what seemed like only minutes the sun was setting. This perplexed me and I looked at my fingers to see them raw and bloody. How soothing this instrument could be that I wouldn't even notice my own wounds. Perhaps I should have just played it for the blackbird?
With the sun falling and my fire failing I decided to grab more firewood from the area. I rebuilt my fire and retired into my tent for the night.