Vargas paused, looking over Chaos-Two.
A pause, and then Vargas reached out one overly-long arm. To offer a pat on Chaos-Two's head: and then a ruffle of Vadette's, between the horn-nubs (and any bite would result in a grin), and a light, stroking touch of the puppy's head. It was unclear if this was genuine affection, or simply a moment of good nature, or something else entirely.
The brief touch had him flinch, not in fear but just at the massive hand suddenly descending upon his head. The Leviathan's words were again mostly a jumble to it, but his last promise--that he would be watching--resonated with the dog. Purely, perhaps, because it was something of an echo of something he'd said several times already, and chose again to parrot now, confidence and reassurance in it: "I will watch."
Then he turned, staring up at the towering form of Chaos Two where it held Vadette high in the air. He understood some of what was going on; but now he found himself curious. "You... Two?" he began, slowly struggling out new concepts, stringing them into verbal form. It was a calm and measured speech, especially for one so young, though the voice was rasping, almost gurgling or choking, with the alien throat and the effort of it all.
"You... will... teach us?" and it stared up, perhaps hopeful or perhaps expectant, or matter-of-fact--there was no facial expression, simply a staring puppy gazing up at its new babysitter.
@V-Chaos-Two
V-Chaos-Two nodded,
They shrugged, for they had never gardened before, and didn't know if such a thing would be possible for their sibling.
Chaos-Two listened carefully. If they raised these two to adulthood successfully... they would earn a prize. A name, the ability to venture from Draco when there are no spawn to care for (or at least choose which of the Chaos Forge to take with them), or the ability to create. To make their own spawn like Overseer Alpha had.
They didn't see the hand coming, their eyes on the ground since eye contact wasn't something they could reliably do anyway, and flinched. A touch of... affection? Pride? They didn't know, and they felt confused and like their heart was soaring at the same time.
They looked up, a rather goofy grin on their face, and nodded,
Their ear flicked to the side before their head followed, and they looked down at the Sentinel,
Reward good behavior and enforce it. The children would learn to do those things in order to receive respect and rewards in return.
They held out a hand to Sentinel to hold, both to keep track of the Gembound and to guide them to their nest to eat and to rest, and then to assess. The Sentinel would need to learn to control their motor functions and speech, as would Agate-One, in order to be able to learn commands and to communicate with them and the other spawn.
There would be trust between them. They would not be a tyrant, but a leader. Someone to look up to and to listen to. Well, that was the hope.
Vedette grumbled and snarled at the finger, hunching down further and tucking in her wings. She didn't particularly want them ripped off, no thank you.
She listened to Chaos-Two and Vargas, listening to them talk. They peered at their sibling and sighed, crawling down and off the kaiju in order to sit beside them, grumpy and hungry and tired. It was understandable, at least.
It was so boring.
Chaos-Two held out a hand to Sentinel and she snapped up and slashed at it. No reaction. She frilled up and stared at the creature, watching it blink at her, slow and calm. So calm.
She clamped her jaws shut and pouted, glaring at the floor. This was going to be terrible. If she couldn't find any amusement from Sentinel and Twobutt, at least anger or something, then she would die of boredom rather than anything Vargas would do to her.
This was already terrible.
She plodded over to Chaos-Two and crawled up their body, pulling on fur and yanking on quills (which didn't budge), sitting on their shoulder. No reaction. None! It was as if she wasn't there! Whatever they were doing, it was working, because she quieted down and pouted, not yelling or speaking or doing anything, really. It seemed ignoring her behavior really did get to her. And Chaos-Two had figured such a thing out the moment they ignored her crawling up their chest to try and get at Vargas.
Ugh.
It was an interesting thing that happened, then.
Vargas was moments from becoming annoyed at V-Chaos-Two--Two beginning to ask further questions, to pry about doing exactly what he'd just said not to do: to take the two young spawn from Draco. He was already formulating the response in his mind, a blunt 'ask me when the time comes' rife with irritation, when Chaos-Two interrupted itself to say precisely that. In that moment Vargas' estimation of the thing ticked up a couple notches: it had come to a very correct conclusion itself, a decision he would have made, and corrected its own answer.
Good. (Of course, if it had come to the wrong conclusion and answered it itself, he'd have been further irked; but it hadn't, and he didn't even think of that.)
The goofy grin it offered him would have perked his brow, if his rigid hide were capable of such a thing. His hand was already back on the floor but was that... a touch of warmth in his chest, a spark of something social? He examined it briefly, but couldn't find it again; a note was taken but for now it was shrugged off as unimportant.
What were they up to--and could it be of use to him?
V-Onyx-One stared up at V-Chaos-Two. He was rapt. Every word the babysitter said, he did his best to absorb. Stimulation. Mountains. River. Not necessary for him. And then Agate was crawling down, sitting sourly beside him.
His gaze shifted, unblinking to stare at her. She kept saying 'fuck,' and he stared at her some more. What was 'fuck,' and why did she keep saying it? A brief categorization of his thus-gained knowledge, his intrinsic if faint understanding of words awaiting its unlocking, found nothing of this one. It did not yet exist in his mental dictionary.
Strange.
When a hand was offered down, he understood instinctively; he plodded forward--staggering, stumbling, childlike--and took it in one of his own. It was a hand, too, what he had: initially aligned like a dog's, with four toes out and one dewclaw, but each were long and curved, like Vargas' thumbs. A strange set of digits, but it granted an opposable finger to four straight ones, and the rough pads on the fingers were warm as he gripped Chaos' own fingers.
Then he waited, staring up, unblinking: waited to be led.
Some distant sense of chaos was itching at his mind. He looked to Vargas, the Master's words a distant hum: no, it didn't come from there.
The Sentinel looked then to the Black Spire in the distance. Groaning, shifting oilstone--yes, it was this that thrummed, this that had sang sour notes to him deep within his stone. He strained to listen, an impatience struggling against his natural patient nature, as if the urge to do something was an instruction from the stone itself.
But without direction as to what to do, he could only stare at it and wait, holding firmly to V-Chaos-Two's hand.
@V-Chaos-Two
Chaos-Two nodded,
Onyx-One would be ready at around that time, but Agate-One most likely wouldn't be if it kept up it's stubbornness. But again, something to discuss later.
They squeezed Sentinel's hand gently, silently asking to be patient, before realizing such a thing was impossible to expect from a child,
They purposefully ignored Agate-One. They dealt with pain on a daily basis, and yanked fur wasn't the worse they'd experienced. But it seemed to frustrate Agate-One into silence, which they were happy about.
Vedette was making small grumbling noises, nowhere near as patient as their sibling. She paced from shoulder to shoulder, hopping onto Twobutt's spear and dangling from their hand, now just trying to entertain herself. She lost her grip and fell, the spear falling with her, curiously enough.
A hand scooped underneath her and caught her, setting her to the ground. Huh.
She looked up at the tawny shape above her, brows furrowed in confusion. Why? Why would they catch her?
She just couldn't make sense of this creature. Maybe taking advantage of them would be harder than she thought.
Vargas considered. He hadn't been aware that the birds were recreating their former efforts here--nor did he care much; Kethri hadn't proved particularly insightful in his mind, with her missing key details or stating obvious facts. But still, their work might still prove useful to the Forge and in any case, they had enough spawn that needed tasks to do, to train them, to prove themselves useful. Two non-chaotic birds trying to do this work alone without the aid of the monstrosities around them, when said monstrosities had several milling about with their thumbs up their asses, seemed foolish to him.
It was something to think about, to stack on top of that list that included such things as 'train the new spawn,' 'scout out Ursa for Mother' and more.
A glance back at Chaos-Two, a final look over the two new hatches, and Vargas nodded and strode off. He had other work to do; for now, the pair would be in decent hands.
He hoped.
Still this child did not speak, clinging to the hand that held him while staring up at Chaos-Two intently.
He didn't move, using a little of the weight and tension of the arm to hold himself upright, otherwise remaining wholly, utterly still.
It was as if, for a moment, Sentinel was a statue; warm, alive, but without a thought in his little skull-like head. In reality there were thoughts there: and impressions, fleeting, of the experiences around him, the speech flying past, the call of the Black Spire's chaos.
But he didn't see the need to vocalize that. If anything it was almost overwhelming, a barrage of sensation and thought that his brain tried methodically to pick through. In time he would speak, but right now, he saw no need.
@V-Chaos-Two