ORIGIN

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Vedette glance back at the incoming pup and snarled, "Stupid! Let go!"

She leapt for it, claws extended, wings flapping (with the one seriously lagging) as hard as they could. She was going to escape and she was going to rebel!

She feebly scrabbled against the surface, catching nooks but not enough to haul herself up with. She gripped and flapped, jumping at it, before whirling around and baring her teeth instead, red eyes bright and full of anger. Hatred.

"I will bite you!", she hissed, flexing her talons, her quills raising and pricking upwards, venomous and dangerous, just like her fangs.

"Haaaaaate...", she hissed, nostrils flaring and ears pinning.

Screw everyone in this stupid cave!!

@The Sentinel

There was no telling how much of Chaos-Two's words the Sentinel had actually absorbed. They had been wise words, carefully-chosen, but his attention had swerved at the first sign of fleeing motion. The creature--sibling? he wasn't sure--bolted, scrabbling for handholds on the wall and failing.

Unaware of V-Chaos-Two behind him--uncaring of its actions or maybe too young or too inexperienced to wonder what it might be doing (or too independent to rely on it), the Sentinel leapt for the Agate. The Sentinel knew nothing of 'danger' or of 'venom.' He only knew his instructions and had a vague, uncertain idea of how to put them into effect. He took the most obvious route--trying to hop up to grab a leg, any leg, and pull. To drag her back to the ground. He didn't speak, and didn't think to avoid the fangs or quills. It might be a lesson he'd learn soon, and a painful one, at that.

"You are not... to escape," he intoned, merely parroting his instructions as best he could.

@V-Chaos-Two

Chaos-Two noticed the bite starting to grow excruciatingly painful, his arm starting to tingle and grow numb. They held it up with their other hand and started at the bite, noticing the small amount of swelling around the bite, like his body was trying to repel an infection.

Or something else.

"Agate-One! Onyx-One!", they snarled, "Enough! Stop fighting!"

They limped forward on all threes, their paralyzed arm practically useless, but they had to break up the fight before Agate-One accidentally injured the Sentinel and paralyzed them too. They were struggling with their wound, breathing hard through their nose.

It hurt so bad- it had to be a venom doing such a thing, a normal bite would hurt, then ache, then heal, not this.

They stumbled and staggered, yelping in agony as the pain started to pulse up their arm, and they turned, eyes searching aimlessly for Vargas.

"MASTER VARGAS!!", they roared, "I REQUIRE ASSISTANCE!"

Vedette snarled as a leg was grabbed, baring her fangs and glaring at Chaos-Two as they called for the Master, probably about to punish her or something. She didn't want to be punished! How could she have known just a bite would do such a thing! But it was a weapon she could use against this one, so she threw caution to the wind, and herself forward.

In her mad struggle to lunge forward, she stepped on her tail and let out a screech, stupidly trying to bite at whatever hurt her, quills now stuck in her hind paw and her face.

She pawed at her face, in pain and struggling to get the stupid things out, her face going numb and her foot also going numb, and hurting more.

She curled up and tried to pluck the quills from her face, tears rolling down her cheeks as she whined and cried, her stupid thumbs able to grip but the pain too great to actually attempt. Great. Her plan hadn't worked and now she had a face and foot full of toxic quills. And she was drooling everywhere too, her jaw slack and her eyes no longer listening to her. She couldn't close her eyes or move them, and speaking now was out of the question.

But at least she'd finally gotten a reaction out of Chaos-Two judging by the tears dripping down their snout as they sniveled and wheezed, trying not to cry but unable to help it. Good. They deserved to suffer.

@Vargas

She lunged for him--missed, harmed herself. Fell.

He had been calculating: paying close attention to attitude, to demeanor. It was with the inexperience of a child that he measured her hatred and disobedience against her cuddling against Chaos-Two--and her biting of him. He had been told to control the other child.

And despite his measured silence up until now, he, too, held chaos.

The Sentinel did not back away when the other child harmed herself: instead he thrust forward with sudden, savage violence, aiming to snag the quills and sink his own claws in and jerk them all, to drag her face down and to him, squeezing it as hard as he could with the points of claws and her own embedded spines. It was a maneuver that, if he succeeded, would likely do damage: there was no restraint in it, only brutality.

He missed, with the clumsiness of a child: stumbling and striking quills that had him pull his hands away instead, but he stared down nonetheless.

"You... will obey," he said, and there was no emotion in it.

He did not strike again, as yet, but Chaos-Two's words were what likely held him back.

- THE LEVIATHAN -

It took him a few moments to cover the distance: swift strides, and then a stare as he approached. He took in the looming black Onyx, the cowering, snivelling Agate. And half-blind Chaos Two, standing a few yards away. "What is it?" he half-asked, half-demanded, patience there but already ticking thin. He'd hardly had time to even begin and now this-?

Perhaps Chaos-Two wasn't ready to be a babysitter for tiny monsters, just yet-... Wait. Vargas' eyes narrowed, examining Chaos Two more closely. Was it--harmed, somehow? "What happened," he demanded, and turned to stare down at the Agate, and at the Onyx. Had the Onyx harmed the Agate, somehow, or...?

@V-Chaos-Two

"I-It bit me-", they ground out through gritted teeth, shaking like a leaf as it held it's limp arm, claws slightly curled but ultimately useless, their entire arm unable to hold weight, "I-I was unaware it had venom- it seems to be too, I-I think it bit i-itself."

Chaos-Two staggered towards the two and managed to drag Agate-One away from Onyx-One, grabbing her by a leg rather than any part of her body. She didn't seem to be able to move her head, and there were quills embedded in her face and foot, from what they could tell by brushing over it.

They sat down and hunched over, unable to stop crying as they sniffled and shuddered, holding their hand and praying for the pain to stop, "It b-bit me like it tried to bite you, b-but since I-I don't have armor like you do, it was s-successful. I-it hurts, Master V-Vargas, and I can't move my arm."

They wiped their eyes and pushed the culprit forward, the creature trying to move despite her head being limp, hanging as she staggered in a circle, also crying as she limped, her face and foot covered in quills, clearly also venomous.

"After it b-bit me it ran for the wall to escape," they said, "Sentinel went after it, but I don't know if it was quilled also."

Vedette was faring a bit better with the pain, it being a pulsing ache rather than agony, but walking was impossible what with her head hanging, making her unable to see. She limped and tried to walk away before Vargas could grab her, her wings tucked in as far as they could be.

She finally fell and curled up as best she could, her tongue lolling out of her mouth and drool dripping from her jaws, her eyes unable to move, pointed in slightly different directions, which was rather uncomfortable. She couldn't blink, either, so she reached up and closed her eyes instead.

Her tail flicked back and forth as she shivered, waiting for a blow or a yank of her wing or something. She wanted to defend herself or at least tell Vargas she hadn't known and that it would be unjust to punish her, but she couldn't.

@Vargas

- THE LEVIATHAN -

He watched, he listened, and--he winced. He'd genuinely forgotten about the venom; some part of him had simply assumed it wouldn't be there yet, which had been remarkably foolish of him. Why would he have thought that-? That was a mistake, and now V-Chaos-Two was paying for it.

Hell.

"I had forgotten that I had tried to impart venom to it," he told it at once, always one to own up to his own errors. "I apologize for that and I owe you, assuming you do not reenter your stone," he added, thoughtfully. It looked painful--it sounded painful--and he wished he could do something for his spawn; but there was nothing he could think of. Magic hadn't been his strong point and bar knocking the creature out--or back into its chryalis, indeed--there was little he could do. "I believe it will cause paralysis, and then fade. I am sorry for this pain, but at the least I can ensure it does not repeat itself." And with that he turned, with those same sweeping strides, to move to the children.

The Agate seemed... damaged. Quills jammed into it, and... drooling? Little fool, he thought dismissively, and paced to her. He moved one hand to try and pin her without quilling himself, moving with the direction of the quills, and spoke as he did so. His tone, rather than enraged, was both measured and authoritative. "A lesson learned, I take it-? I think we had better clarify some things." There was warning in those words, but not an outright threat--not yet. "Listen closely and if I hear one 'fuck' from you I am breaking one of your legs." He paused to let this sink in, and added: "That would hurt a great deal."

After a beat, he spoke further. "I do not care why you are fighting. You will cease fighting your fellow members of the Chaos Forge. We will train you to fight others. Obedience will get you rewards. Disobedience will get you punishment. If you try and leave here I will find you and break your wings and your legs, as well. You are not to bite anyone. You are not to stab anyone with these quills," he added, lifting a finger from his other hand to touch one, peering at it. ...He'd done well, apparently. "Obey these things and we will teach you to use those quills, and your venom, properly--without stabbing yourself. We can be allies or enemies. You do not want us to be your enemies."

He paused again, eyeing her over. "Can you speak? If you can not, nod to agree--or shake your head to disagree, and I will break your wings and we can discuss it further when you can speak."

He wasn't leaving, it seemed, many options.

Vargas swung his head to the Sentinel, then: small, staring up at him in eerie silence. "Do not harm this one," he warned, and then after a beat, "but well done in chasing it down." -Was it Sentinel's doing, somehow, that Agate had stabbed itself..? He wasn't sure, but he had to assume as much. That, or she'd somehow done it through clumsy accident.

He glanced over his shoulder to see if Chaos-Two was coming, then looked to Sentinel again. "Pull the quills from it. And do not cause more harm than needed. Do not fight it," he added, to the Agate, his tone again one of measured warning. "It will hurt more if you do."

The quiet steps of the Leviathan had his head turning, and he listened closely to the Master's words.

He took mental notes.

Threats. Domination. Chaos-Two had used gentler persuasion, and the Onyx made a second note as he watched: He is not my friend. A reminder, of sorts; a cementing of the thought.

Then he looked at Vedette, and considered.

Break wings. Break legs, he noted to himself. But when the command came to remove quills, he reached forward in an attempt to do just that. He didn't have the sense to pause, in case she fought back: he tried through force, instead. Were there a bite, a struggle, he would try to pin as Vargas did, one hand beside the Leviathan's: but perhaps it would not be needed. He was not unduly rough, but nor did he hold back: he reached for the first quills with the intention of gripping them one at a time and yanking them carefully free.

In silence, he obeyed, the exact opposite of his sibling. Whether this was better, or worse, was yet to be seen.

@Vedette

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Vedette

The Sentinel

Maximus

Vedette

The Sentinel

Vargas

Maximus

Vedette

Vargas

The Sentinel