Closed Peace and Quiet, Carving and meditation

[Ximal]

Laughter ? Was that ana's voice? Disd she have a death wish?! Xi shook his head as he leered over the edge again. Now seeing that the pair of them were "asleep" Xi shook his head and was told again what he'd just seen by a woman who'd appeared next to him. How long as she been there ? At least she seemed fairly free of any of intent to aggravate the situation. Xi shook his head lightly and heard a response from banir about alea being his first friend. Xi let his still half liro gaze drill into banir for a few seconds before he made a statement to him. "Thank you for pointing that out miss? And banir. Your first friend, and yet you protect her when she doesn't even make an attempt to help you do so. How is that showing any "friendly regard"? She just used you like a human shield. Personally, ive had few friends but i at least know that trying to do as they've asked over doing what they want is something which a friend would do. The don't hide behind each other, they attempt to help resolve a situation not aggravate it. Much like you did. To be honest, she's lucky your her friend. Xi's grip tightened upon the rope ads then his mid shifted back to the thought of hauling their asses back up. "Ban i've got the rope tight enough climb down and get collect your trouble maker and the peace maker. I'll secure the rope, and i also send you because i doubt alea wants me anywhere near her.

[Vaspira]

Vaspira directed her attention from the two girls to Xi to answer his question. Vaspira is my name, and I have a better idea of how to get them awake and alert. Vaspira grinned evily and stripped off her mothers cloak and took off her bag. Standing before the two men naked she plunged over the side and landed in the net as a large black leopard. From there she proceeded to lick the girls faces. Nothing like stinky cat breath to awaken the dead. Ana still did not wake up, but Vaspira could hear Alea's quickened heart beat when she started licking her face. The girl was not asleep, she was awake, pretending to be asleep!

This made Vaspira laugh, which came out as guttural growls, and she decided to lick Alea's face, paying close attention to her nose and mouth. She would be tasting her cat breath any minute now, and then she decided to rake her claws gently on the girls arm, not causing blood or scratches, just a painful annoying sensation that no one could ignore.

[Alea Davenport]

Alea could hear Ximal talking above her, and as her closed eyes grew hot she clenched her fists to stop herself from climbing up there to kill him. What right had he to lecture about friendship? What right had he to judge her? If Banir wanted to be Alea's friend, that was none of Ximal's business. Even worse, if Alea didn't think of something, she'd have no choice but to go back up the rope to where that pompous, arrogant, son of a codfish was waiting.

It wasn't long before Alea had more pressing concerns, however. When she felt the net swaying from the large body that just jumped into it, she at first thought it was Banir. But when the rough, rank tongue started licking her face, it was all she could do to avoid jumping away and crying out in disgust. Since she was still trying to feign sleep, at least for the benefit of the men above, she managed to just scrunch up her face, trying to keep as much of the cat-saliva out of her own mouth as possible.

When the cat started raking her arm, she could ignore it no longer. But nor would she come along quietly. She had forgotten all reason, all sense of consequence, and knew only that she must not be made to go near Ximal. And she would get her way with violence if necessary.

Quietly and unobtrusively, so as not to immediately alert the men above, Alea grabbed the cat's throat. She squeezed hard enough to let the kelvic know she meant business, but she would give her one warning before she actually tried to cause permanent harm. A year ago having a giant cat on her would have sent all sort of ghastly scenarios of her grisly death running through her head, but if she'd learned anything, it was that fear of death or terrible maiming wasn't enough to stop Alea when she'd committed to a course of action.

Still, some part of Alea knew that petty threats weren't going to impress a cat this size. She had to show the cat she meant business. In an attempt to remove the kelvic from her person, she headbutted the cat's nose with all the force she could summon.

OOCSorry for the physical violence ^^; Alea gets out of control sometimes

[Banir Ironwood]

Banir looked at Ximal for a moment and held his gaze. It was one of those long and awkward moments. The many he had experienced being so quiet in the past and still now. Simply staring at Ximal with no hostility only a sense of what was and what will be. He pointed at the Xi and simply said, "friend is a friend." Pointing down to Alea he merely repeated his sentence. "Friend, is a friend." Though he hadn't said it the subtle point behind the four words that he had repeated was quite simple. Once he had announced someone as a friend, there was no way to change his mind about it. To him anyone as a friend weather he liked it or not, he accepted them. Their strength's, their support, and their power as well as their flaws, shortcomings, even their burdens. Though when he was instructed to head down the rope he simply nodded and turned to jump off the edge. A thought in his mind to stir Alea, however he was beaten to it.

As the Kelvic spoke on about something that he was for the most part ignoring whatever she spoke he wished to be focused on the task at hand. Though as he turned to look at the Kelvic to examine her intentions he was caught off guard and very much so by surprise. For soon beside him the strange woman began to strip! With eyes that turned a powerful light red, his face under his scarf and hood turned a bright crimson. Though it hurt to do so he felt his jaw slack and open his mouth. He had never seen a naked woman before, not in his thirty seven years of life had he ever seen one. His eyes took in her full form before he quickly turned around his light redden eyes still full of shock and awe. This was definitely not how he planned on this day going. To see a woman stark in the nude was a nice and new experience he still believed that perhaps she could have done that in private?!

As he heard the thudding of paws on wood his attention turned. This woman was a Kelvic. Well at least that explained the abandonment of modesty. Sighing he collected himself, trying to force a steady emotion from himself. As he tried to clear his mind of the most recent images he failed a few times. Though with a few long and steady breaths the red drained from his face. When he opened his eyes the where a calm white, he had spent a chime or two in the surprise of his experience.

Now with his emotions duly dealt with he turned to the edge, looking over he noticed Alea interacting with the large feline. He wondered how to best land in a net made out of vines. Though they could hold a few Jamoura that did little to reassure his more emotional side. Taking a breath he thought up a few words see if this would make her move. "Alea! Watch out! I'm coming down!" Naturally he wouldn't actually land near her, perhaps north of her a little. As he stood at the edge he simply leaned forward and fell. The man was truly like a rock sometimes, as he fell he felt this heart race madly in his chest. A small bit of black fear ate at his eyes, he felt like he could turn into a ball of fury at any moment. Though once he was in the embrace of the vines the fear quickly wilted. What in Ivak's name was that just now? Taking a moment he merely shook his head as he tried to get up on two legs. He had landed a little way's away from Alea, though the most troublesome part was finding his footing.

[Vaspira]

The small girl was actually trying to hurt her? She was only trying to help; she wasn’t trying to hurt the girl, so she was confused as to why she deserved the hand around her throat. Vaspira let out a small low growl as she felt her hand squeeze her giant throat, thankfully her hand was too strong and her strength too weak to really do any damage. Then the little wench had the audacity to head but her nose. She sneezed snot and blood in the girls face from the contact, and brought her paw up to wipe at her poor little nose. What was this girl trying to accomplish? Did she not understand that she was no match for a black leopard.

Vaspira was about to enter a blood rage and rip the small girls throat out, enjoying the metallic liquid on her tongue. But before she could attack one of the huge men jumped into the net, jostling her out of her rage. Vaspira shook her head, this was the last time she would help the two girls, that was for sure. The next time she saw this little girl, she would rip out her throat, and there would be no one there to save her. Vaspira growled a small growl at Alea, then looked over at Banir. He can tend to these two, especially the small little wench. She was done with useless drama and pretending to be damsels in distress. It pissed her off that she was pretending to need help, when she in fact did not. Vaspira shook the thoughts out of her head, she would deal with this little girl later, in the dark, when she wasn’t surrounded by so many people. She would regret hurting her for the help she was trying to give.

With the end to those thoughts Vaspira backed up in the net, using her muscles she jumped from the net, sinking her claws in on the edge of the petal, pulling herself the rest of the way up. She sat down beside Ximal looking down at the mess in the net. Vaspira tended to avoid such petty drama if she could, and this was one of those instances. The two men seem to have it under control, she hoped they got that one girl out that was passed out, but she hoped that they dropped the other one, letting her fall to her death. Vaspira could not help the low roar that came out at the thought of the little wench.

Her anger was getting out of control, the animal wanted to kill her. She needed to leave before things did get out of hand. She changed back to her human form, stuffing all her clothes in her backpack except her bladed cloak; she took that and wrapped it around herself.

Nice meeting you Ximal, as well as Banir, I would of liked to meet this Ana girl, but oh well. But the next time I see that Alea girl.. her throat will be ripped out. Vaspira did not wait for the reply, she turned and walked away from the petty drama and mess, and the anger that kept stirring inside her.

[Alea Davenport]

The spray of cat-nose-fluids on Alea's face was possibly the second grossest thing she had ever encountered. Forgetting everything else for the moment, she wiped at her face with her brand new fur... she would have to wash these later... By the time she had cleaned her face off enough that she could no longer feel the slime of cat boogers, the giant black cat kelvic was gone, and Banir was there instead.

Alea felt like it was time to take stock of the situation. Ximal was at the top of that rope, and Alea refused to accept any sort of help from that... she couldn't even think of a word dirty enough to describe him. But Ana was apparently either very determined in her acting, or she really was asleep. Alea would not be able to get her very far without help. And now Banir was here. And he would try to resolve things peacefully. And the only way he could succeed was if Alea did not go near Ximal.

Out of respect for her friendship with Banir, she decided to take the most peaceful way out of this situation. After crawling on the net toward where Banir had landed, she spoke to him in a low voice, so that her words would not carry to the nemeses waiting above. "If I go near Ximal again, I will attack him. But I probably should not leave Ana in the nets, so I need you to take her... somewhere. I don't know where the best place for her is, but I trust you to figure it out."

After receiving some sort of affirmation from Banir, Alea proceeded to crawl across the net, away from the rope Ximal had lowered. She could and would find her own way out the the nets. When she got sufficiently far away, she could almost feel the the tension draining away as she forgot about insufferable people and could focus on the task in front of her.

Soon, the net became more vertical than horizontal, and she was pulling herself up on the slugsuckle vines. It was nice to know that if she fell, she would not fall to her death. But she still wanted to avoid falling because it would mean she would have to start climbing all over again. It was at least fairly easy--much like climbing a ladder--until she got to the top.

Where she had ended up, there were no real handholds that she could grab onto to pull herself onto the petal. She tried to pull herself up anyway, but her foot on the nets swung wildly, and with nothing for her arms to grip, she slid backwards. She let out an involuntary yell as her equilibrium switched from vertical to horizontal, and she flung her arms, wildly searching for something to grab onto.

She almost immediately caught a handful of net, which stopped her downward progress abruptly. She spent a few moments hanging upside-down, catching her breath, and contemplating the solution to her problem, which was apparently NOT 'just climb up'. Looking around, she noticed a few slugsuckle vines hanging down a ways over. Getting herself upright before the blood rushed to her head, she climbed sideways across the net until she could reach one of the vines. Testing its weight, she pulled herself up.

Keeping a grip on the vine was an effort in itself, the tension of trying not to slip off taking up most of her energy. Pulling herself up the rope-like vine was more than she could manage. Fortunately, she was already at the top of the net, and only needed to be a few feet higher to reach the petal. She swung her legs upward, and tried to gain purchase on the petal with her boots. In a sort of half-crab walk, she managed to get her body onto the safety of the petal, and she released the vine with a sigh of relief.

She looked back across the petal and caught sight of the others, which caused her to scowl. That Ximal... she wouldn't be able to live in the same Spires as him without meeting for long... And when they next met, she intended to make sure he regretted all those things he'd said about her. Somehow.

[Banir Ironwood]

Banir watched the Kelvic leave the nets, her animal body jumping back up to the petal. It wasn't a very high distance but he was still surprised that she had managed the jump without at least bouncing in the nets first. Then again he had a different task ahead of him. Looking down he saw that Alea, as he had though, wide awake and wiping cat snot from her face. That was kinda disgusting, and he bet Alea was defiantly not very happy. As she finished whipping the snot from her face she told him her plan of action. She didn't want to be anywhere near Ximal. He wished people would get along better, but if she was feeling such hatred towards Ximal that she'd attack on sight. These where thoughts for later, right now he had a job to do. Nodding at Alea that he understood he figured they would meet up sooner or later. The Spires was big but he knew of only a few places that the majority of the population would gather. He supposed he'd meet her either in Garth's Rest or another place where people congregated in mass.

Waving a silent good-bye as she left he looked down at the unconscious woman. In his mind he guessed she must have weighed less than the armour on his person. She was thin and looked rather nice as well, some dark circles under her eyes but otherwise still beautiful. Shaking more thoughts from his head he reached down and picked her up gently. Trying to keep in mind that his armour did have some sharp points. He went with the only option he could think of. Taking his right shoulder guard he loosened it making a little more room. Slinging it down a little more then tightening it again so it wouldn't fall off his person. Taking the woman he grabbed hold of her and threw her over his shoulder. Trying to be gentle was tough but he was more than sure she wouldn't receive harm from it. Looking up at the rope he walked over to it careful of his footing. A hand on the back of his passenger that lay on his shoulder. Alea had requested that he take her to a safe place. The only real place he knew was Nature's Nurture. Since she was unconscious perhaps that was the best place for her to go.

Taking hold of the rope he tugged it once just to be sure, Ximal said it was secured but he just wanted to make sure. After all this had to hold his two hundred and forty eight pounds. Plus twice as thick cold iron armour. And the woman on his shoulder with whatever she weighed. Taking hold of the rope he began to scale it, realizing he was a lot heavier than he thought. Hanging on for a moment he focused his strength into his arms and began to put one in front of the other. Pulling himself and the woman up with some difficulty. As he neared the top he held on with one hand with a grip as strong as he could make. Quickly he moved and put the woman Ana onto the petal first, his legs dangling uselessly below him. His right arm was getting sore and quickly halfway through putting Ana on the petal he used both hands to secure himself once more. Then using his arm to put her on the petal he made sure she wouldn't fall back down again. Banir began to pull himself up. This was a lot easier without the woman on his shoulder. Taking both hands and grabbing the edge firmly he lifted up then promptly turned around. With his rear just on the edge he began to scoot away. Bringing his knees up he leaned onto his feet then stood up. Looking at Ana he reached down and picked her up in his arms. His right arm under her back and his left looped under her legs. He wasn't breathing hard but his arms sure where tired.

Looking at Ximal he waved at him using his left hand. He walked up to his friend his scarf and hood still covering his face. His red eyes looking up slightly at the taller man. He took in a long breath and prepared a few words in his head. "Ximal I think that, I should take Ana, to Natures Nurture, just to be safe. And make sure, she's okay and all. We can meet up, and talk later if you, want. But until then, I shall see you, another time. Have a good day, my friend." He bent forward slightly to Ximal, he didn't like to be rude. And figured this was the best course of action.

[Capricious]

Banir Ironwood

Award

Skill	XP Earned	Lore Earned
Carving	1	• Nagging Thought: Alea is Scary
Unarmed Combat	1	• Attempting to Diffuse a Tense Situation
Observation	4	• Middle Ground is the Best Ground
Persuasion	3	• Ximal Needs an Ego Check
Body Building	1	• Alea Will Be The Death of Me
		• Nagging Thought: Why Do I Care for Alea?
		• Physical Geography: A Woman's Body

+1 mask

Alea Davenport

Award

Skill	XP Earned	Lore Earned
Stealth	1	• It is Better to Not Fight
Climbing	2	• I Dislike Ximal
Intimidation	2	• Nagging Thought: Teach Ximal a Lesson
Rhetoric	2	• Ximal Needs an Ego Check
Observation	3	• Rude Gestures to Provide Opinion
Brawling	1	• Being Forcefully Taken Over Into the Nets
		• Faking a Nap to be Left Alone

+1 lynx pelt, medium lynx fur gloves, medium lynx fur hat.

Please deduct 26 gm from your ledger.

Ximal

Award

Skill	XP Earned	Lore Earned
Intimidation	3	• Alea Davenport is from Denval
Observation	2	• Nagging Thought: Teach Alea Davenport a Lesson
Rhetoric	2	• I Need an Ego Check
		• Being Stuck in an All Against Once Situation
		• I AM Being Fair!

Even though you already did, this is a note that Ximal is 44 gm less after this thread.

Ana Sol Starris

Award

Skill	XP Earned	Lore Earned
Observation	2	• Ximal Likes to Pick on People Smaller Than Him
Stealth	1	• Ximal Needs an Ego Check
Intelligence	1	• Attempting to Make Up an Excuse to Diffuse a Situation
Rhetoric	2	• Forcefully Taking Something Over into the Nets
		• Passing Out From Adrenaline and Sleep Deprivation

Vaspira

Award

Skill	XP Earned	Lore Earned
Observation	3	• Stepping into a Tense Situation
		• Using Cat Breath to Waken Someone

Hi There!

This was a lengthy thread with a lot of detail packed into four pages. With so many people, I could have easily missed something or forgotten to award something. If you see anything wrong, please let me know!

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