ORIGIN

Vargas shouldered his way with grunts and grumbles through the thick jungle of Eridanus, doing his best to ignore the bloodcurdling shrieks of the Lessers swarming the trees overhead. He didn't like this place; it was good for hunting, sure, but noisy and vibrant in ways that he detested. Give him the ominous silence of dark, cold spaces and the hunt, any day, over this screeching disobedience.

"TITANITE," he bellowed, for the third time. Alpha should be somewhere behind him and, if the Orthoclase had any sense, it would be following the path Vargas broke through the foliage. These damn--vines- he thought, tearing another snarl of greenery from where it threatened to tangle around his chest.

When at last it came into sight, he lurched to a halt, eyeing it up and down, and grunted. It was not even half of Orthoclase's height; he doubted it stood any decent chance. As a scout among forest it might have been useful, but unless it had greatly honed magical skills, it was likely to get obliterated in battle. That said, it wasn't exactly fair--was it?--pitting a shock trooper against an infiltrator. But tests were tests; and this one had yet to be, well. Tested.

Maybe it would surprise him. Probably, not. And it was about testing Orthoclase, too. He'd see how they both fared and make his judgments then.

"This is your sibling Orthoclase-Alpha. I told you you would test yourself against it. Now is the time." They were both full-grown, now, and that's all that he'd been waiting for. "I hope you have been practicing." Vargas stepped aside, with a grunt, glancing back for Orthoclase-Alpha--to let it get a look at its until-now unmet sibling.

The call of its maker.

Titanite curled its own way toward Vargas' shouts, moving far more delicately through the trees. It was easier, for it--it was much smaller, for one, so entire trees were not an issue for it; and its magic, at least in part, tended toward some harmony with the forest. A little twist here, a flicker there, and some of the plants even seemed to part for it.

It came into sight on all fours, at first, prowling like some wicker-woven demon dog, and then--when it had sighted them--pushed itself upright. It stood only perhaps nine feet tall when fully upright, to Orthoclase-Alpha's eight in general. But it felt no fear; it felt nothing, really. At times, the Titanite was more plant than animal, and now it stood silent as its father spoke.

He had not been created into the culture of testing and trials that the others had, and most of it was foreign to him. He held an aloofness about him, one it might be wrong to call 'haughy' but as if it merely did not mean much to him at all. No, his life was about standing in Eridanus, among the leaves and vines; feeling the light on his bark and the nutrients at his roots. His... toes.

Whatever.

His voice, when he responded, was raspy and without real tone, like branches rubbed together or leaves rustled by the wind; it wasn't quite clear how he formed his words, though the jaw did move. "Overssseer Vargass... I am here." It looked to Orthoclase-Alpha, dimly noting the similarities between them, and the differences. It did not understand why they had to fight, really; it had no desire to fight.

It said so.

"I have no use... for fighting. I do not wish... to fight. But we... must?" It looked to Vargas, and perhaps to Orthoclase-Alpha--if it had arrived, as yet--as if asking confirmation of this.

Vargas eyed Titanite, and grunted. It wasn't that he was... disappointed in it, exactly. It was just that he had a good tendency to find the use in creatures, and Titanite was one of the few who baffled him. The question, "what is it good for" had no immediate answer; did they really need someone to, say, hide in bushes..?

They'd see.

He turned and paced out of the way, and then turned back, dropping to his haunches--though tensed to leap back, if the violence of their brawl swept his way--to watch.

"Begin," was all he told them, roughly.

Titanite's toxic eyes--and they shared that among them, did they not? all three of them--turned to Alpha as it spoke.

"I know that it is a test," it rasped, slowly; was Alpha arguing, or was it trying to inform Titanite of facts it thought it did not know?

The branch-creature was unsure, and were it not for the great respect he held for Vargas (was there even warmth there-?) it would have refused this 'test' with distaste. It was pointless. For what purpose did they need to be tested-? But his was not to question Vargas. Perhaps if he'd been raised with the rest of them, he would know the answers to his questions, but he hadn't--he'd spent his cycles standing in grass, staring at trees. Hardly prime material for learning of the Overseer's various sinister plans.

At Vargas' instruction, it rumbled, that quiet rasp becoming a sound of thought and of concentration. It had never truly... battled, before. It stepped back, sharp-taloned forelimbs reaching, as if grasping, for the foliage around it. That was all it knew, really; to call on the plant life to aid it. There were thorned vines all around, though Alpha was doing its damndest to trample them.

...Maybe that would just make them angry, and more liable to help Titanite. It didn't know. Titanite would've been mad, at least.

Orthoclase-Alpha dragged itself up like some sort of eldritch monster, tearing through the vines and shrugging off Titanite's magic with pure, raw strength.

This was... alarming.

The tree-beast let out a slow wheeze that might have been the plant version of "oh, shit," and then twitched the taloned fingers inward. Its magics, admittedly, were not as strong as they could have been--should have been; it had not been training relentlessly as its sibling had been. And Orthoclase-Alpha was-... huge. Titanite had never fought, it did not know what damage those massive limbs and gnashing teeth might do to it, but it did not particularly want to find out.

It sent its plea into the forest around it, surging magicka into the plants, seeking to animate them further to fight for it.

Maybe if Orthoclase had to fight some bushes, instead of it, it'd have some room to maneuver further.

So far, so... well, not good but he wasn't dead, that was something but he wasn't making any headway, either. He was delaying Alpha, and the "hold him off until he exhausts himself" certainly worked both ways. Titanite couldn't keep magic going forever.

One bush flash-fried, its tearing branches smoldering smoke skyward, leaves wilting and curling as it collapsed to the Orthoclase's magic. It could only hit one at a time but how long could he delay it, really-?

His plant-mind churned through ideas, but all that really came up was "keep fighting it with trees." Titanite abruptly wished he had the light magic--the more powerful version of his own--to blind the Orthoclase. He'd have to learn that.

Well, he could try to bind its limbs, at least-?

Titanite decided on that, but then ran into a new problem: it had six.

The-... back ones, then. The propulsion ones.

That would do.

Titanite focused on the vines all around, struggling to bring them together, to wind Orthoclase's hind legs, at least, together. He worried that it might move just as well on the front four, but--he'd have to see.