ORIGIN

"Ow," Cairn said listlessly as the leathery membrane of a black-and-blue wing hit her torso (the humanoid one) despite the lack of pain the movement caused.

There was an explosion of soil and pellets, as the pipe-cleaner went parading into the little mound of dirt. Cairn's arms remained outstretched in front of her where the storm was a moment before; standing where she stopped as coffee beans were massacred and devoured like a herd of 2004 MMO gamers pulling the boss before the healer got back from getting a sandwich.

It answered one question, at least. "Oww," she responded, and some twenty minutes later, she found herself by a stream.

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"Fish'll fill you up more," the foal had promised the storm, as she parked the worm-on-a-string on her back and clip-clopped her way to the river cutting through Eridanus. It wasn't deep by any means-- but it was enough to house a few iridescent fish in its waters.

Cairn plodded along the shoreline before she entered the cold water at a trot; only stopping once she was up to her knees. Her upper-half bent over and she parked her hands on her legs like an old dad about to ask what all this was, looking into the water. She couldn't see anything, but...

She pointed. "There's food in here," the centuar declared, and then added (for the storm's understanding) "oww," which must have been the universal language for 'food here' as well as 'ouchie.' "My dad gets fish out, sometimes, but his mouth is really sharp and stuff so it's easier for him."

Shango didn't have hands, though-- and he didn't have thumbs. Maybe, just maybe...

Silver-blue-green dashed by her legs and with a resounding "waaah!" of a warcry, Cairn lunged forward. If it had been a fish, or just light playing off the water-- it was unclear to her. White fingertips grabbed nothing but cold water and in an instant her hind legs were up in the air.

And it turns out, surprisingly, that centuars weren't very good at keeping balance on just two legs. As soon as two hooves participated in liftoff the rest of her followed suit; she fell tail-over-head into the water in front of her and while this hurt considerably more than falling into a trench (for it accompanied the failure of getting food), like the indestructable bouncy-boys that children usually are, she came stumbling right up with legs flailing and droplets of water careening in all directions.

"PFFFTTT," she spat out water and then continued to spit like she were trying to eject her own tongue out of her mouth (dirt taste bad), hands clawing at the soaked-through mop of hair covering her face. "Where'd it go?!