ORIGIN

The thulite, of course, did not react. Kitty briefly mused that she was lucky to have gotten the normal ones -- she imagined that a life stone would not only be rather morbid decor, but would also probably put up way more fight. She'd tried to bauble her own stone a few times, and it had worked for a little while, but it had faded pretty quickly afterwards. These worked fine, though, so she figured it was probably just to do with the "life" aspect of it all.

Her moonstone was rather well-hidden on her underbelly, but she thought about it quite often. It was in the shape of a little crescent moon, buried within her dark fur. Some Gembound had much more ostentatious stones that were easily visible, or even decor -- Sunny and Comet came to mind off the top of her head. Binh, too, had a rather large and pretty stone, although his was more of a hinderance than anything else. She wondered if Comet was deaf in that ear -- Kitty hadn't ever asked.

Granted, she didn't really know how ears worked beyond the obvious. However, she did more or less know how this worked, and so she let her magic flow over it. Perhaps as penance for having scorned her a moment ago, the stone came back with a vibrant glow. Kitty beamed along with it, and returned it joyfully to the other pile.

The panda's attention turned to the last, lonely thulite resting in the dried grasses and mosses of her tree hollow. "You look awfully lonely there," she commented, drawing it closer. "Maybe you'd like to join your friends?" Kitty looked at it for a moment. "... You know, I have so many friends. But the problem is, I don't know if they have me. I don't know if they really like me, or just like me 'cause of what I can do for them."

She frowned at the thulite. "Course, you don't really care. You're just a rock. I only care about you because of what you can do for me, but that's fine. Because, again, you are just a rock. A pretty one, but a rock, nonetheless." Magic pulsed through her, and the bright glow matched the other few-and-far betweens (including the last one) she'd made over the course of this little trip.

Kitty looked down at the pile of glowing stones as she finally returned all twenty five to each other. "I made you what you are," she said, one ear flicking. "You existed for another reason, and were pretty and fulfilled your purpose as being a rock without me, but then I took you and made you fit mine." She stared at them for a moment longer.

Briefly, she wondered if she had been Baubled. But Kitty dismissed that with a sigh. "This is not some great ethical dilemma! This is just rocks. Duh." After all, it wasn't as though rocks had free will, wants and desires, needs and dreams.

They were honestly just rocks.

Kitty finally flopped back into her grasses and curled in them, the pile of glowing thulites in view. They were pretty, exactly how she'd hoped they'd be. She was glad Forgraves had given them to her, and didn't feel the least bit guilty about lying (at least in part) to get them. Kitty was not a saint, and she never had been. She was a creature motivated strongly by greed.

Still, she thought as she let exhaustion take her, they make a pretty awesome nightlight. As if on cue, the cave lights outside flickered and dimmed. Her internal clock noted that they were off schedule, but honestly, they didn't work all that well to begin with. And honestly, she didn't particularly mind going to sleep a couple hours early.


/exit kitty to sleep