An important distinction - Printable Version

Eleven let the artificial breeze toss her fur gently, soaking in the room's bright and wild beauty. She blinked away the dark bruise that was Draco, before turning to her face her companion, the Gravedigger. "So, this is Pegasus."

She took a moment to trot around, stretching and preparing her legs for the chase to come. "It's long and it's nice, and there's plenty of things to practice our uh, skills on." They weren't here to just hunt. They were here to make a statement. To PROVE that NOBODY should fuck with either of them. EVER. But that was still a little intense for Eleven. She was adjusting.

"Out in the woods," She pointed to the forest with a talon. "There's a bunch of small stuff, if we want to try something easy. In the meadows there's faster creatures - and the deer. The deer are huge. But y'know... It might impress Vargas, or whatever."

All your dreams are down below

the gravedigger

Gravedigger halted at the entrance to Pegasus, taken aback by the stark difference between the cave they had just been in and...this one. He turned his head from right to left, slowly, taking in the view from one side, then the other, to ensure that he was seeing correctly. "Oh. It's lot lighter here." It didn't bother him at all, actually it was a nice change of pace, but also he simply didn't know how to say that this place was beautiful.

He lumbered after his...ally? coworker? sparring partner? fellow trainee? friend? The word escaped him. Regardless, he followed, albeit a little more awkwardly then the longer-legged Eleven.

"It is big," he observed, thoughtfully. Big and full of things to knock over. He could see the trees in the distance and for some reason he got a little excited thinking about one of them falling over due to his involvement. "I'm not very fast. Uh. What should we go for?" Yes, the deer would impress Master Vargas, but was that the goal of this exercise? Or was it to just...try and turn something inside out? Or even just release the itching under Gravedigger's skin for chaos and mayhem.

And he was feeling a little overwhelmed by this cave at the moment. It was very obvious, from the frequent blinking and the general look of being totally lost.

buried under broken bones

Eleven looked over Gravedigger, attempting to make some internal calculations, and struggling to do so. He was much slower than them, built low and sturdy. Would he be able to keep up with a hunt? Surely. How else did the Master expect him to feed himself on the surface?

She knew she'd have to do a lot of accommodating. This thought didn't bother her much, surprisingly.

After struggling to get her brain to work for another 30 or so seconds, she began to think aloud. Process of elimination - where shouldn't we go? "You don't have to be fast. You have to be smart." This did not bode well for either of them, so far. "If we're working together it's going to be easier. One of us could chase a lesser into the path of the other."

"If it's not a deer, we have to be stealthy. If it is a deer, we have to be careful. They don't run as much, but they do fight back. It'll be more like a spar than a hunt."

"So it depends on how much effort we want to put in, and like... What kind of insides we want to work with. I could probably chase a rabbit into your mouth easy though."

All your dreams are down below

the gravedigger

Gravedigger tried to focus on Eleven as she talked, but it was hard when the cave they were in looked like this, when it was so wide and open and vast and different from Draco, he just wanted to stand and look at it for a while But...no, no they were here to train and practice. Keep focused. This was part of training, to stay on task.

He nodded along. "Okay. Maybe...you can chase it to me then? You are probably faster and more agile." He was confident in his own strength that whatever Eleven decided to chase his way, he was sure he'd be able to take it down.

"Perhaps something larger but not too large. It will be hard to...uh, work with something too small? But it also might be too much work with a large deer, huh?" He grumbled, indecisive. "A smaller deer? Or a large rabbit? What will be easier to find?"

buried under broken bones

Eleven wasn't sure how fast she was, but she'd be fast enough. That's all they really needed. "The only smaller deer are the babies. Should be plenty of rabbits in the meadows." She gestured to them, the distant, cheery flowers waving gently back. "They're tiny, so we'll have to be careful with them."

"It's an open area too. It'll be easier for us to move around." Because both of them were stupid big, and Eleven was too heavy to traverse most treetops; She had found that out the hard way.

She was content to take charge of this part, finally picking up on the fact that the Gravedigger was not confident in this step of the process. She wondered if Vargas had been hand-feeding him until now, or something similar. Higher priority or not, it didn't seem to serve him well. That, and Eleven didn't want to resent him any preferential treatment.

She becoming pretty sure she liked the guy, which was an odd feeling.

"Let's go." Eleven began a casual trot toward the clearing, keeping her pace a little slower than she normally would. The Gravedigger would have to work to match it regardless.

Skipping to the interesting part; It only took them a few minutes moving along the river when they spotted the small, slow moving shapes of a Windhopper colony, grazing amidst a particularly colourful section of Pegasus. Eleven lowered her voice as she spoke, though the rabbits were still a distance away. Just in case."These guys are annoying. You'd think it'd be easier to catch them because they're like, the perfect snack-size, but they're not. And they make you feel stupid for trying because they're soooo goddamn fast. Like, everything here either outruns us or bites us back. It's dumb."

"Anyways. I'll try to sneak around the ones keeping watch right now, get a good angle, and then hopefully lead a big one back to you. They're fast as fuck." Eleven pointed a claw at Gravedigger, inches away from his face. "You need to be faster. Just for a moment. Then the fucker's dead."

"Sounds good?"

All your dreams are down below

the gravedigger

His eyes (two of them, his head was tilted so he could see her a little better) were trained on Eleven as he forced himself to stay focused. It was roiling in the back of him now, that delicious craving for blood and mayhem. Not long, not long now.

He nodded along, without much else to contribute as Eleven planned out their course of action. "Okay. You chase one to me. I'll make sure it doesn't get away." He could be fast when he needed to be, and in short bursts, it was chases that he didn't think he would excel much in.

The Gravedigger lumbered after her again, pushing himself to keep up with his...uh....were they friends? It was a word that kept appearing in his head whenever he tried to name what she was to him. But he didn't know what being a friend meant. That wasn't something Vargas had taught him and it didn't feel like it fit in with all the things he'd been taught and told.

Anyways. Hunting time.

He pulled his head up to try and get a better look at the oddly green rabbits in front of them. They looked fast, even with just the markings on them, but they didn't need an extended chase, right? Just a snap of Gravedigger's jaws and it would be done. Not that he wanted it obliterated before they had the chance to...experiment.

Which made him remember something else. "Okay. Should I try and capture it alive? I can try and break its legs so it can't run. But it might be harder then just killing it outright." A precise strike against the legs would cripple it easy but it would be just that - precise. Gravedigger excelled a little more in the "large destructive hits". Although this would be good practice.

He eyed the claw pointed directly at him and, oddly, let out a snort. "I can be fast for a second. I'm not totally useless." It was said with levity, no real weight or intent to self-insult. "Sounds good. I'll find a good spot where I'm concealed. I don't need to see them - I can hear them moving." He lifted his bat-like ears for a moment - that was his natural advantage brought to the table. The rabbits wouldn't be able to run from an attack they couldn't see. Either behind a rock or in some taller grass - if they didn't see him but he could hear them, easy catch.

As soon as they were ready, he'd do just that, find a good spot in the tallest grass and flatten himself as much as he could while still crouched and ready. His ears remained perked and ready, the slightest trembled in his claws giving away the excitement.

buried under broken bones

Do we kill it or catch it first? Eleven would've shrugged her shoulders if she could. "I mean, it's up to you? It'd going to be dead anyways by the time we're done with it. Just... Try to keep it intact." This would be a feat, considering the size difference, and the immense power undoubtedly stored in the Gravedigger's jaws. She thought back to their spar for a moment; It'd practiced self control then. Hopefully it could channel that now - though admittedly, Eleven was much harder to break than a bunny.

I'm not totally useless. Her own ear flicked in response. She was trying to be supportive, but it seemed it'd come off as patronising. She swallowed back the words 'I didn't say you were,' and instead stored the interaction somewhere in her head, and began to approach the Windrunners.

Eleven was not a stealthy animal. She was trying to be, but it was difficult when she stood out so clearly in the brightly lit flower-field she attempted to stalk through. It took the rabbits around ten seconds to notice her, and then they were off to the races. A blur of small green shapes scattered for their burrows, and Eleven was forced to try to keep the pace and herd them towards the waiting Gravedigger in one attempt.

She didn't have to out speed them entirely. All she had to do was haul ass just enough so that she could gently guide one of them into her new friend's open mouth. Or waiting claws. Or however he wanted to do the job. The important part was getting there.

The one Eleven managed to corral was not an impressive specimen. It was small, undoubtedly young and inexperienced. With a pounce that planted her next to it, the rabbit panicked, turning suddenly to run back where it'd come from - and further from the safety of its warren.

It wasn't headed toward the Gravedigger directly, he'd have to lunge to catch it. But he still had a chance. Eleven slowed her sprint as she watched the Windrunner run towards what would, ideally, be its end.

All your dreams are down below

the gravedigger

He waited in his spot in the grasses, worried for a moment that Eleven had messed up as the rabbits scattered, but he was impressed by her quick thinking, pulling it back together. The rabbit was coming closer and he shifted just a bit, edging closer to its sprinting path. He bunched his muscles, ready to try and strike precisely so they could have a live subject instead of a dead, useless one.

He could be fast when he wanted to be, and the power in his legs were put right into the jump, propelling him forward surprisingly fast. Still, there was a limit in how fast someone of his size and bulk could possibly be, and as he came flying out of the grass, the wind hopper had just enough reaction time to slow, turn, and sprint away.

It was still too late, of course, as a gigantic claw reached forward and grabbed onto the rabbit's leg, crushing it into the ground. The rabbit squealed and struggled against his grip and he panicked as he struggled back to his feet, not daring to move his leg even a little bit in case it got free. "Hey, I got it! Barely!" He had probably broken its leg somewhere in that mess, but at least it was still alive and in his grip.

buried under broken bones

There was a crunch and a shriek, and Eleven sped up once again to close the distance, eager to verify what sounded like great fuckin' news.

"NICE." She squinted at the wriggling rabbit underneath the Gravedigger's claw, studying his - their - catch. "Sorry its small." Her bad.

Maybe the amount of dexterity required to extract this thing's insides would prepare him for the bigger targets he'd face... The first step is starting small. Usually. That way everything that followed would seem easy in comparison.

Eleven tried to recall the ideas she had previously, but they were running away from her. All that panicked squeaking was filling her head instead, making her jaws twitch (and a tiny piece of her heart pang.) She was not used to keeping something injured and alive this long.

"SO. Um. Are we doing this from the outside or the inside?"