ORIGIN

"Booker Speech" "Louie Speech"

A constant dribble back and forth between his home and the outlying caverns. Something was putting off the vulpes from returning as he tried to gather his thoughts for ho to do this properly. Last encounters with Booker had been a lot more pleasant than he had been expecting, more civil than how they usually were. Louie was growing up and no longer just a puddle of emotions that actually didn't click together properly. Everything had been sorted, he would be mature about his mistakes and own up to when he was wrong. At least if it benefited him.

The angry carvings of the tunnel wall faded into the open expanse of the giant room. Within its centre, the twister riled and lashed out angrily, absorbing all sound and loose debris. One tended to get used to the constant tugging and straining against fur and skin pulling him towards his death. Two eyes now sat nestled within his skull, the remaining burns and scars no longer as severe as they once were and he appraised the area as he had the first time he'd wandered in here. Where he'd established the Merry Men with vigor, despite his stage fright forcing him into the shadows behind Diamondfang. Since then, it had grown soft, becoming a nursery to the children they had decided to breed. Iliad and Odyssey were the only two who he really cared about. Nemesis' child he'd never laid eyes on, the same went for the tortured looking monkey.

Tensions between Fleur and Diamondfang were unknown to him, but he wished to seek out Magdalena and Nemesis. To explain what power he now possessed and how he intended to use it to bring the Merry Men out of the dark and control the caves. A goal he had always had, but one that he couldn't entirely visualize by himself. Louie understood that Magdalena was above whatever ideas he had. Most of them would drive anyone around him into the ground. But he was ambitious and he couldn't keep going if he didn't have ambition. As he rounded towards the back of the cave where the platforms were, he didn't bother concealing his voice as he began to climb.

"Magdalena," and then with a little bit of hesitation, "Nemesis." Of course he owed them an explanation. Now he was doing it before he did anything else. Patience was certainly a virtue in these moments.

Oh look, there was that fucking eyesore, yet again, coming to steal Nemesis' girl from under her. The king himself, the royal green fuck-up, the one who made her guts boil and her ears sting with his very voice. For some reason, as her head swung towards him and her navy eyes met his, she found herself smiling. Calmly. Too calmly.

For whatever reason, she didn't actually feel hate. She damn well tried to hate him, to loathe him, but he came crawling up and announced himself and... So far, he wasn't just shoving her off so he could steal the Princess. The Knights found herself grudgingly accepting his presence, whether because of Magdalena herself or some remains of unsquashed loyalty she had overlooked.

The trinoceros flicked and ear and stepped between him and Magdalena, protectively, letting the heat swell up to the edge of her skin.

"... Yeah?" The word came from her lips, sounding dull and lame from her voice. Pathetic, cowing, bowing to the man who had sired the children she loved more dearly than their father deserved. She could not hate him, not truly, but boy did she try. It was so difficult when you saw the good of a man in the hearts of his offspring.

"Magdalena Speech" "Nemesis Speech"

The summoning did not have Magdalena hesitating; his voice had stirred a myriad of emotions inside of her chest. There was the ever instinctive relief and excitement, subtle as it may have been, to realize that he was alive and well and back home. But the reminder of his betrayal, his relationship with Booker, had her soured just as quickly. Dismay and diminutive anger bubbled in her lungs. It would do her no good to dwell on it. She had work to do, both with him and on her own, and his treachery would only serve to distract her.

She unfolded her limbs and rose, weaving carefully through the platforms. It hadn't taken long for her to feel the thunderous footsteps of Nemesis approaching as well, her warmth and cultures both reaching out and drawing her in. Though she was mindful of her steps, the borzoi made a point to join the side of her brutish companion as soon as they had fallen into the same path. In silence they had pursued the calling until they reached him, and she felt him - so much more alive than the last time she had seen him. Magdalena hovered by the trino's shoulder, allowing her to step forward while catching the glow of heat draw from her skin. She said nothing. He could explain himself.

"Booker Speech" "Louie Speech"

There was a moment of genuine surprise over the lack of enthusiasm and usual vigour in Nemesis' voice. Usually, it was harsh words directed at him, or at least a disapproving glare. Something had changed, he assumed that it was because his DNA was laced into the children of her beloved princess. It threw him off guard, Louie found himself flushing under his fur, if only for how this was as good as praise from the rhino. "I'm back... Booker, he was there when I hatched. He told me how you two had visited me." It wasn't the perfect baseline for the conversation, mentioning the name of the numbat he knew Magdalena held contempt for. "We spoke. It was brief for what it was worth. The understanding that he held no place in my life was met." "For now anyway," he added as an afterthought.

Both his working eyes, came to rest upon Magdalena. Taking in her lanky beauty, the eyes that were clouded and held only images of darkness from the woman. Louie wasn't sure what his feelings for her were, but he wasn't very good with any sort of feelings other than rage, annoyance and pride. "Magdalena, I hope you can forgive me for my shortcomings in the events that have transpired." Unaware of her manipulation of him in his true moment of weakness, he spoke clearly. From the heart. He wouldn't leave them in the dark again. Now that he was back, he had to stay. Leaving behind the Merry Men for his own selfish reasons wasn't going to cut it anymore.

"I want you both to know I'm here for the Merry Men. I have no intentions of slinking off and performing acts for my own selfish reasoning. They will all be for the group, and my children."

Nemesis stared, focusing her attention towards Louie while her mind raced in circles, trying to find some way to bring loathing to the edge of her skin like she had with her flames... But alas, it simply wouldn't. The cowardly, miserable fox groveled around with his honey-sick words. He could have been lying, scraping for pity, but Nemesis hardly had the energy to pick through and catch him in it.

Hell, maybe he was being sincere. The rhinoceros rolled her head in a shrug, cracking a joint in her neck, and let out an exasperated huff. "Well, good. S'how it should be," was all she could come up to say, awkwardly shifting her glance to Magdalena. It wasn't really much of her business, she supposed, even if that was the most frustrating part of it. She loved Magdalena, but she was insistent on making sure the canine was free to do what she liked. She deserved the world, in the rhinoceros' opinion, even at the expense of what Nemesis wanted.

It was incredibly hard not to be selfish. She batted her eyes at the white, thin figure for a moment before return her focus to Louie. "Just don't... Bring home another dragon, alright?" She huffed at him, trying to lace some humor into her dry, painfully awkward words. The baseline requirement was a pathetic attempt at a joke, and it did nothing to fix the tension. The air felt thick enough to be melted by Nemesis' heat and cut by her own blunt horn. She was suffocating in it.

"Magdalena Speech" "Nemesis Speech"