"Speech"

Eira bounded ahead, relief tingling right down to her paws as the howling winds of Monoceros began to fade out of earshot behind her. Her whiskers wiggled cheerfully, feeling a hint of pride that they were moving away from the perceived demons in Monoceros. Surely that would work to their advantage; if they couldn't hear it, it couldn't hear them scheming the road to its death. A thrill ran down her spine and all the way to the tips of her paws.

Realizing she'd ran ahead, the young otter paused and turned around so that she could check to make sure her partner was keeping up. They'd hatched alongside one another in Monoceros and now they were sticking together.

Eira finally seemed to notice her surroundings, and took careful note of the odd items scattered here, strange shaped lumps of metal which had long since rusted. She didn't seem all that impressed, but an old sword caught her eye as a jewel in its hilt flashed at her. She immediately waddled over, poking with a tentative paw at the gem. The rusted sword itself was unimpressive but the way the gem glinted was appealing, also reminding her of the cluster on Kimen's shoulder.

Once more she turned back to the way she'd come, nose twitching and pink eyes flickering.

Kimen lagged behind, though only because he had been crawling down the tunnel for the last couple of yards. He could keep up with Eira's walking pace when on his hind paws, although he found it difficult to balance and rather straining on his back so for now he crawled albeit with a limp.

When he hatched from his chrysalis, the red panda found a strange gem imbued into his shoulder, much like the one found on the otters' face. His gem impaired his ability to walk naturally though and he had spent quite a large amount of time trying to find an easier way of travelling. It was okay though, it didn't bother him much as he held onto the determination that his deity would fix him. His deity, the one who named him, was an omnipresent voice that he believed helped him from time to time.

They had hatched together, himself and the otter, and she was his companion, his partner, his friend. They had just escaped the ferocious winds of Monoceros but he had no idea of where they were headed. He was happy that they were no longer in the crypt where they had first met each other and where he failed to walk.
He did not want to return there for all his life, it was filled with bad thoughts and hopelessness. After what had transpired since he had hatched, he vowed to never give up again, no matter what the task and no matter what the consequence.

"Speech"

After a few moment's consideration, Eira lifted her paw to the lump of rusted metal and grasped at the shiny stone embedded in it with rubbery little fingers. A bit of rust came away, leaving only more blackened metal exposed beneath. The gem, however, didn't budge. She looked disappointed, and lifted her lip slightly to show her disproval at the rust. She tugged at it again, not a budge. Again. And again.

She was eventually distracted by the scraping of claws close by, and turned to see Kimen approaching fast. She examined her formerly pink paw, now stained red-brown with rust. She raised her paw to her mouth to try and clean off the dirt, only to gag at the odd metallic taste and spit out globs of rust. Ugh... A shudder passed over her, so instead she sat vack on her haunches and tail and rubbed her paws all over her chest, leaving the white fur smeared with rusty pawprints. She seemed to neither notice nor care as she waddled over to her friend.

"Yo," she drawled as she scampered over, flicking her tongue like a little snake as she caught the taste again. As she reached Kimen, she turned and spat on another chunk of discarded metal, wiggling jer nose to try to get flecks off of her whiskers. There were little streaks at the sides of her mouth too, but never would she admit to it being a dumb idea in the first place. "What do you make of all this weird stuff?"

Eira looked around, spotted and pounced on a smaller scrap to try and show him.

He began to approach Eira as she had stopped to observe something. He was quite proud that he wasn't too far behind even though he was rather unsure whether this was Eira slowing down for him, or if he had actually improved his walking speed. He assumed the latter to be most likely and limped on, undefeated by his crippled shoulder.

The otter turned around towards him, a metallic orange substance smeared across her snowy fur. His companion had done a few bizarre things, including magically dowsing her fur in water, but this was possibly the strangest so far. She seemed displeased and discomforted by the substance. On closer inspection, Kimen deemed that it had came from a rusty metal blade with a gleaming gem in its hilt.

"It all looks very unnatural. No, nature didn't put these here. Somebody else did. Maybes we should leave them alone in-case they come back?" He responded to the otters question. He didn't like the look of the metal that was scattered everywhere and her less-than-pleasurable interactions with it only made him more wary.

He did wonder where they come from, how they got there. Perhaps some warriors passed through and dropped their blades? Or, even better, we're stood in the scene of a great battle! He enjoyed that thought the most and imagined being at the lead of such warriors. He decided that their swords almost certainly wouldn't have been dropped if he was their general as a good general would tell the warriors to always have their blades by their sides.

"Speech"

Eira listened intently to his words before pausing and turning to look down at the hunknof metal she'd just pounced on. Without much consideration she raised her paw and slapped it across the room. It was heavy though, and was indeed a lump of torn metal. It rolled about a foot before it clanged to a halt, but Eira was left yelping. "Demons! Ow!" she yelped, flailing around her paw which now had a tiny gash across the palm from the serrated, torn edge of the metal.

Seeming to think this was the height of arrogance from these 'demons' she bunched herself up and stalked back over to Kimen, muttering under her breath.

"How do you know?" she asked, sniffing and against her better judgement, licking her paw. That made the stinging subside a little. Although she seemed to enjoy disagreeing with Kimen, as she looked around Eira could see what he meant. To an extent. The shapes of the metal didn't look like stone. And some bits were very precise. Oddly. "I think the demons put it all here. If they come back, we should ambush them!" She huffed, seemingly pleased with her conclusion.

"I dont think there were demons here. I think it was a group of warriors. They dropped their swords. They might come back though, no good warrior should be without their sword!" He replied, hoping to dismiss Eira's strange claims that demons were the cause of everything.

She had being raving on about demons since they met and whilst he had his deity, an equally impossible idea, he believed that his deity was for him and himself only. Truthfully, he wasn't quite sure if his deity was anything more than a belief, after all he had no explanation for it. What mattered to him was that his deity gave him hope and filled him with determination.

"And even if there were demons," Kimen continued, "I don't think I'd be ambushing them very quick." He joked, nudging towards the gemstone lodged into his shoulder.

He wasn't fond of the idea of ambushing anything. While it was a solid tactic for getting the upperhand when out-numbered and under-powered, he decided the notion of fighting without the need to was a rather unruly one.

In response to his words, Eira wrinkled her nose and sniffed as though in disregard for his words. In her mind, demons existed, and in her mind she was the hero who would stop them. "Well maybe the demons chased them away..." She muttered, breathing out heavily. Her brow creased around her gem; she looked deep in thought. "...we should stop them! We could be heroes! We could take them back their weapons. Can you imagine it?"

The fuzzy fur along her spine stood on end and she grinned, baring sharp little teeth. She was excited now, really excited; she imagined a grand adventure ahead of them. "Besides, if there weren't any demons here, why are there pictures of them all over the walls?" She gestured upwards to the elaborate carvings, depicting many dreadful creatures looking down upon the tunnels. Some of the ghastly curiosities even had jewels imbued into their designs. Creepy... She glanced sideways at Kimen, and Eira felt herself triumphant in this situation. She carefully took in the shape of each carving in case she had to hunt them. "Aren't they scary?"

She tipped her head as she joked at him and then rolled her eyes. It was unclear if she'd got it, or if the joke had flew right over her head. "Well, I would. They'd ambush us if we didn't." It seemed she paid more attention to his criticism of her beliefs than believing her, and she scoffed quietly under her breath. well, when he's attacked by a monster, I'll be the one there to protect him.

She looked at Kimen sideways, but her gaze softened slightly, giving way to a hint of rarely-seen fondness beneath the stubbornness.

I'll need to be.

"Indeed," he responded, "They are rather creepy. I guess some people just have active imaginations, much like yourself I suppose." He chuckled, taking in the bizarre drawings. He judged them as nothing more than what he said they were, strange embodiments of somebodies daydreams, after all how could things so peculiar be real?

He let out a long yawn, low in pitch and much more like a cats purr. He was getting rather tired though this came as no surprise. They hadn't rested since hatching and that was quite a while ago now, that and they had travelled what felt like a great distance without stopping. "I think we should find a place to rest, don't you?"

"Speech"

Eira seemed slightly displeased by this answer. He'd even had the guts to proclaim her assumptions- no... Her knowledge, as an 'active imagination'. Hmph. The more she thought about it, the more she disliked it. "I don't think so. I personally think it'd take a demon just to get that high up, let alone make the marks." She seemed pleased with her perception, and eyed Kimen wearily as she wondered what excuse he'd come up with next. "Besides, at least I have an imagination." With that subtle insult Eira turned and strutted over to where she could see the entrance to a larger cavern further on into the tunnel.

"Can we go over-" She was cut off by her own yawn but immediately snapped her jaws closed, looking at Kimen irritably. "Rest?" she asked. "Why would we wanna do that?" Eira waddled back over chest puffed challengingly. Perhaps she just enjoyed 'debating' (aka... arguing) though; it seemed like there might have been a soft, smug smile on her face. The pair's conflicting views but especially Eira's challenging temperament, could spell out a recipe for disaster. Eira seemed to like the risk, not fully understanding it.

"And where?"

She was stubborn, Kimen knew that. He was strangely beginning to find that aspect of her somewhat charming rather than annoying. The red panda appreciated her company and despite their obvious contrasts, part of him felt like he needed her. Without her he'd probably still be stuck in the cave where he hatched, immobile and useless. He was certainly grateful that the otter was there when she could have always just left him behind.

Eira yawned and it was plain to see that his tiredness was shared, the otter just didn't seem to want to give in.
"Because-" he yawned, "-we're both very tired and need our rest before we walk any further. If we can find some place soft with less rocks, that'd be perfect, so long as its safe obviously." He flicked his tail behind him, beginning to gain control of it a little. He planned to rest his head gently on it as it was long enough to reach. He never paid as much mind to his tail but since he had learned how to flick and move it he had been silently obsessing over it the entire walk down the tunnel. Thoughts of resting on it only made him more and more tired though.