Flashback Beachside Foray

[Boris]

Summer 32nd, 511 AV High Sun The human city was left behind. Boris had done her visiting, played with the humans and their pretty, color-shifting eyes. She saw the large, white, shaggy-furred land-predators—the ones like her, who could take a human shape. She wandered the garden filled with shining sculptures, and marveled at the ice and snow. Boris had listened with fascination to their strange, melodic language, hearing the human elders tell stories to captivated children and lazy, happy Kelvics. It didn't matter that she didn't understand the words. Their speaking sounded like music, and music told a story all on its own. Boris made up the stories in her head, about dolphins, birds, fish, sharks, and Great Ones. When the children laughed, so did she. It was a good time. Boris did so love the humans. Then it was time for her family to move on. Boris abandoned her human shape and returned to her pod. They moved ever onward, following the currents and shoals and the birds. She wasn't sure how far they had gone from the Vantha place, but here the air was warm, and today the sun was bright. Her pod had recently gorged themselves on shinyfish, and were contently lingering near a formation of jagged rocks not far from the coasts of the North Lands. There they slept, played, and leisurely explored, made lazy by full bellies and good company. Boris was always easily bored. The ocean was her Sky, but unlike her family, she had feet, and the Land was another Sky to explore. She never went far—it was much too strange and large and unknown, and anything unknown was dangerous. Because she had seen these rock formations before, and played all the same games and ate all the same food, she grew tired of the water and ventured onto land. A starkly nude human woman, lean of form with short-cropped hair, walked the quiet beaches alone in the warm sunlight. Not far from shore was an older female dolphin—her adopted mother—keeping a close eye on her strange daughter. Boris was happily oblivious to much of her surroundings, searching the sand and rocks for pretty shells and little black crabs, reclusive things that hid under rocks. Finding one particularly large crab, about the size of a coin, she lifted the hapless creature to her mouth and bit into its hard shell. It tasted salty and gritty in her mouth. "Ow!" One of its large pincers drew blood from her lip. She tore it away in panic, then hurled the terrible creature at a rock. The shell cracked further, and she knelt down to rip it apart with her nimble human fingers. "I want my other mouth," she muttered angrily. "But I like my hands."

[Xiani]

"Daylight trips are practical! Not only do they increase your stamina, but your tolerance to the daylight," Elder Shai chided in response to Xiani's grumbles as she and other students had landed in the branches of trees. Some draped themselves over the limbs in defeat, while Xiani and others crouched proudly, only mumbling their distaste for a long flight in the middle of the day. A strange, rushing sound could be heard only a mile or less away, it beckoned to the more adventurous wing-mates as they sat through another one of Elder Shai's lectures about how to find food in new areas and the like.

After awhile, he dismissed the eager young Zith to explore the area and return at dusk for the return flight. Like leaves in the wind, they scattered, one way or another, to inspect something strange or hunt something that had caught their fancy. Immediately, Xiani took to the sky in search of the source of that strange sound. Could it be that expanse of water, not too far off? Xiani decided to investigate.

The flight was quick, but she found something even more strange. If ever she had considered the sun to be harsh, this strange, white powder that tried to devour her feet was blinding. And more than that, it burned her sensitive soles. Vexed and seeing only one immediate solution, she sprinted headlong down this shifting earth toward the dancing water, nearly losing her balance several times when her mind expected to encounter solidity. The relief is immediate to her scorched feet, she releases an involuntary sigh. A strange motion in the water rushes at her and, out of instinct, Xiani kicks it, spraying herself with the salty water. 'This place is horrid!' Xiani thinks sullenly, abruptly disinterested in the entire place. Ready to be done with the nonsense, she raises her wings and prepares to take flight.

[Capricious]

Xiani

Award

Skill	XP Earned	Lore Earned
		• Daylight Flights Increase Stamina and Light Tolerance
		• The Sand Burns

As Boris is retired, I will not be grading for her. Should Boris return, I will happily regrade.
There was not a lot to award. I wish this thread had been continued!

If you have any questions or concerns regarding your grade, please send me a PM and we can figure it out.