It had just sat down for a nap somewhere in a far corner of Orion. A nice, cool, shady area, exhausted from a day of moderate work, in a nice bed of moss that had been growing in the crevices. And when it had closed its eyes, it fell into a wonderfully deep sleep, free of dreams or nightmares or restlessness. Just peace and relaxation to take it through the night.
And it had thought that it had only been a single night, so it was quite surprised when its eyes blinked blearily open to see nothing but deep blood-red surrounding it. At first it was confused, unable to remember where it was at all, before raising its head. Or, at least, trying to raise its head. But it felt something solid and hard halt its movement for a moment, immediately causing an instinctual panic. It was stuck in a cage, solid walls on all sides, and it had no idea how it had gotten there.
It lashed out, punching at the walls of its chrysalis, but the gemstone shattered easily, sending shards flying away and dumping Ruby-Beta on the ground, where it gasped in a breath of air and immediately coughed up a mouthful of fluid. Great, now it was all sticky and wet and feeling absolutely disgusting. Ugh.
It immediately stood and stepped away from the remains of its chrysalis to turn around and clean off its pelt. The fluid tasted funny and there were bits of ruby stick in its tangled fur, which was weirdly oily and flaked with old skin. Damn, it was like it hadn't given itself a proper cleaning in cycles.
It froze. In cycles. In...cycles. Its eyes moved towards the chrysalis. It had been in its chrysalis. But it didn't remember ever getting in there. It didn't get in a fight or anything, it wasn't forced, was it? Which meant...it had been hibernating. But for how long?
Oh shit. The Overseer was going to kill it for missing its test. And its training! It was supposed to be training all this time! It groaned and sat back, then, lifting its paws to rub at its face. Oh, man, it was so screwed.
Bloodstone was toddling along, trying to remember the steps that Alpha had "taught" them in their last lesson. Scent out prey... track it, find it, kill it- there had to be more steps than that. How were they supposed to kill it? They'd have to find out, they supposed.
Left, or Condemn as they'd started secretly calling themselves to differ between the others, was sleeping, nestled up with her head turned towards their spine to keep her from flopping around as they walked. Inferno and Char, the middle and right heads, were alert and attentive, looking around and trying to find something of interest to scent out. So far it wasn't going great, but it had only been a few minutes.
Inferno grumbled softly as they lifted up a rock, finding nothing underneath, not even a whiff of prey (though they did find a cool rock!). It was rather boring as they walked along, sniffing and searching up and down, left and right, sideways and up ways- nothing.
They were awfully startled when they heard a rather nasty crack ring out from one of the crevices in the walls. It woke up Condemn, who grumbled at the other two heads before being shushed quickly, all three peering around the corner like it was a cartoon, one on top of the other.
Oh that was a person- should they tell Alpha? Investigate?
Before they could come to an agreement, Condemn dragged their body forward, cooing curiously at the being within, head bobbing up and down as the other two hissed and growled at her for her sudden action.
The superego to their ego and id.
@Ruby-Beta
It didn't notice the creature at first, too busy trying to figure out what on earth it was going to say to the Overseer when it met up with him, and rubbing furiously at its eyes, but then there was a voice, calling out to it and it paused, blinking blearily and looking up. Something was approaching and it had to stare at it for a moment to realize that it wasn't three separate creatures, but one.
It's tail swished behind it as it stood, stepping forward and leaning down to sniff the hydra curiously.
Condemn went to reply before Char interrupted, eyes narrowed,
Condemn shot him a nasty look as Inferno sniffed at Ruby curiously, all three heads showing clearly conflicting opinions before Inferno piped up,
All three heads seemed to pause and think about that fact, mumbling to each other about how the Overseer did in fact, look a lot like Master Vargas in terms of head-shape. And so did Ruby...
Three sets of yellow eyes narrowed in on Ruby, each of the heads looking her up and down before Char spoke again,
Inferno backed them out of the crevice, dodging snapping teeth as the two quarreled before sighing and looking to Ruby-Beta,
@Ruby-Beta
Beta's eyes widened at the mention of the Overseer, but, really, it shouldn't be surprised. He hadn't exactly been hiding himself and he must have had a good amount of time to roam around and make himself, and the Sentinels, known. It wondered, then, how the others were doing. If Alpha had actually done something useful with its life instead of bully, if the others had ever gotten scouting missions from the Overseer, or if any of them had run a Trial without it...
It shook its head. No, no way a Trial started without them. The Overseer would have found them, right? But who was this Master? Nemean, maybe? But that didn't really seem right because it didn't look anything like Nemean. It snorted.
But the answer came a moment later. Overseer Alpha. Which made Vargas a Master. Eyes widened and, before it could stop itself, it was bursting into laughter.
For a second, it considered not Bloodstone its name, because then they'd go running back to Alpha and Over-Master Vargas and tell them all about how it was sleeping all this time, but they'd probably find out anyways.
The other two heads nodded, Condemn much more enthusiastically than Char did.
Condemn turned to face Beta, ears perked up,
Char hissed at Condemn and snapped out at her,
Inferno blocked them out, already looking tired of the two.
@Ruby-Beta
It was a little confusing following three heads, but he did as the middle one asked and focused on that one, especially while it was talking. Probably the controller or just the main head. Perhaps the others had sprouted off of it, since they were a little mismatched compared to the middle. Its tail flicked suddenly when the thing mentioned Alpha nearby. Immediately, its nose flared, trying to catch a whiff. It remembered the scent that it caught on the thing now - that was Alpha's scent. It just barely caught that smell in the air, some ways away, and it internally cursed itself. How did it not notice until now?
It wanted to decline, but it realized that it would probably tell Alpha that it had run into it here, and Alpha would probably tell Vargas and then it would really be in trouble for disappearing. Might as well just get it over with.
It snorted when Condemn commented on Alpha's ability to teach.
Inferno nodded and waddled off, their stubby legs carrying them surprisingly fast towards where they last saw Alpha to be.
Bloodstone made their way across the rocks and through the various obstacles in their way, still searching for something to eat. When they caught a scent... all of the heads reared up and faced towards the lone rabbit that froze in the hydra's fierce gaze. Teeth were bared and fins flared, before they shot forward, each maw wide open, ready to snatch up and rip apart.
Char snatched up the critter first and rose it up to try and keep it from the others, each head tussling over the poor critter before tearing it into 3 pieces and gobbling them down, with only an ear left. Inferno picked it up to carry to Alpha as proof of their kill, and lead the rest of the way back.
@Orthoclase-Alpha
@Ruby-Beta
Alpha did, of course, trail after them. Just on the off-chance of betrayal or conniving or running away. It clung to the shadows, but didn't make any particular efforts towards hiding. Just reducing its own noise and making sure it didn't ruin the hydra's prospects.
There were some voices - one was... familiar - murmuring through the ruins, and just as it went to check more closely on Bloodstone, the whelp came scuffling towards it. Toxic eyes glanced down at it, and it rose from where it was crouching.
Said with none of the joviality usually associated with the phrase.
@Ruby-Beta
Beta followed after Bloodstone, really not looking forward to this, that spark of jealousy that had started in its chest growing hotter as it thought about what it had missed while Alpha had been out training and getting Vargas's approval, but when it turned the corner to see the beast, it found itself no longer nervous. Here was someone it knew, a hatchmate, given life by the same being. It bared itself in an attempt at a grin.
It's tail flicked behind it as it snorted with amusement.