A wet, ragged mess paced through tunnel E. Fleas, panting, stinking of wet dog, and altogether looking disheveled, her jester's collar jingling all the while. "Has 't be here...has to be." How foolish of her. She'd gone and signed up for some death mission, without remembering that jester. She couldn't just leave him around here. Fleas sniffed her collar, pushing aside her scent as well as the fabric's own weathered scent, but it was no use. Whatever scent had been on the collar wasn't in this tunnel, at least not anymore. "Hells!" She cursed. Fleas sat on the wet pebbles, scratching at her neck.

"Nothin's easy for ol' Fleas." She grumbled. "Guess I have to go looking through each hole I find individually!" She barked into the tunnel, her own irritation echoing back at her. "You'll end up owing me when I find you," she grumbled, digging into the first little alcove she found along the river.

Fleas scraped out the material of the alcove. She sniffed it. Well, it was something. She picked up the object, placing it in an obvious spot by the trickling stream. Fleas gave herself a well deserved shake. Then sneezed.

"Couldn't have died somewhere more convenient, huh? Put a sign out or something? It's not exactly warm here either." Fleas grumbled, padding further down the tunnel. Soon as she found another little spot, a collection of rocks with a small nook hidden in the back, she put her nose down. Then, she got to work again.

She scraped away, finding the the alcove free of anything worth grabbing. Just atoms of dust and little river pebbles. She yap-yowled in frustration. All this effort for that tiny scrape in the ground. It'd hadn't been easy on her paws either. There was the threat of an ache in them, one that warned her paws would feel like walking on spikes after another ten of these.

With a huff, Fleas set off along the stream again. She'd just find a different hole. She hadn't even liked that hole. It didn't take long for her to find a one, a little cliff over the stream. It's overhang shielding it's contents from her.

Fleas stuck her head into the alcove. The ice cold stream water flooded around her legs, the chill piercing through fur and skin. She ignored it best she could. But it was for naught. This alcove, too, held little of importance, unless you really liked staring at empty rock. Fleas didn't. Fleas' ears twitched back, annoyed.

It was obvious that whatever had been lying in that alcove, had there been anything there, was long gone. She padded from the water, grumbling about her freezing paws. She sat on them in a dog loaf to warm them, taking a perfunctory look about.

Oh. Well that was easy. That brief look around had another odd object catching her eye, tucked on a shelf of rock above. She rose, shaking herself out. The loaf may have warmed her paws a bit, but it also served to spread the chilly water onto her belly. Not the greatest idea she'd had. She was, at the very least, rewarded by her look around though. Fleas tip tapped over to it, squinting up at the thing. She leapt upwards, catching herself on her stick-like arms that trembled as she forced them to hold her whole weight. Her jaws snapped widely on the shelf, one eye smushed closed against the stone.

"Almost.." She wheezed out, stretching out her tongue to snag it. "Gotcha!" She bit down on it in a firm but delicate grip. Her arms gave out. Fleas hit the rock below in a way that had her side throbbing. She gasped in pain, eyes squinting, and dropping her new aquisition. Her paws twitched with the pain. "Ow," she wheezed. "Y'had better be worth it." She rose, stumbling, picked it up and placed it with the other items she'd found. She panted, eyes haggard. The pain was all it took to have Fleas tiring of this routine. She glanced around one final time.

The final object that caught her attention glinted at the bottom of the stream. Her frown deepened, but with a sigh she waded in. Scraping at the bottom of the stream was arduous. The current fought against her attempts, and the water slowed down the strokes of her paws with stubborn perseverance. Fleas was just as stubborn, though. And she was much bigger than the stream, a fact she was weirdly proud of. She dislodged it, and as the current clumsily snagged it, Fleas caught it in her jaws. She got a mouthful of water, but she'd also caught her prize.

"Hawh!" She said, muffled, then trotted it over to her collection. She was soaking wet, her muzzle and everything below her neck dripping with glacier water. But she was a winner. Fleas shook herself out, inadvertently splattering her items with water. She paused, licking her snaggletooth. "Whoops." But she had what she wanted, at least. Fleas sat, head tilted as she analyzed her tiny collection. Now what'd she found?

She found stuff, all right.

The first of "stuff" was a twinkling fishing hook, abandoned but a pretty silvered steel, still attached to an old catgut line. (The gut was not, in fact, real cat. Probably sheep. But old, and mummified!)

The second was an old ring, probably smuggled here. It wasn't magic, but it was pretty cool; old, brassy metal with a tarnished gleam and a chip of (inert) amethyst cut and fitted into it. It was sized for a very large humanoid finger.

The third was a tarnished, ancient silver coin. There was no telling who had used this, or why. But it had been here, and as she carried it back to her collection, Fleas would notice something else.

There was, now that she was facing away from the water, something cut into the alcove here--like someone had carved, or maybe magicked, a little chair into the rock wall itself. It was water-worn, but now that she looked, it was impossible to miss. And once she investigated more closely, she'd find other things. Another handful of once-shiny rocks lay deeper back, someone's old collection, but it'd long since grown moss and been half-covered by grass. A few rotted tools--wood and bone, simple things, like a comb and a fishing rod--lay stashed in among the shadows.

And beyond those shadows, deeper back and along the alcove's floor, Fleas would suddenly feel that the rock beneath her feet was... different.

Smoother.

Warmer.

And should she look more closely... redder.

A sheet of ruby--an ancient chrysalis?!--lay beneath her paws.

@Fleas

strong language

Fleas stared at that darkened alcove, even as she padded to drop the coin into her little pile. It fell with a soft tinkle, bouncing off her paw, but she hardly noticed. Her head tilted. Huh. Well this was convienent. Fleas stepped over her collection, inching towards the lived-in area as if she expected it to sprout fangs. She sniffed at the little trinkets and tools, dusty and stinking of moss, age, and mold. Then she noticed the warmth beneath her paws. Fleas blinked. She lowered her head to sniff at the strange rock. There was a subtle depth to it. The depth of a gemstone. A-a chrysalis? Fleas' eyes widened and she sneezed, scattering dust and pebbles. How had she been that oblivious?

"How long've--shit! Hey! You! Are you uh, the Jester! You in here? Ya in here, Jester?" She said, pressing her ear against the chrysalis. Fleas bit at an itch on her shoulder. "Uh, I'll getcha out, y'hear?" She padded around frantically for a place to start digging the chrysalis out, settling on a spot that seemed deeper. She didnt know if it was, she just, yknow, had a good feeling about that spot of pebbles. With no better option, Fleas planted her backlegs and began scraping away at the surrounding ground.

For the most part, the terrain was rock. Centuries--millennia?--of water and mineral buildup had mostly buried it, but it wasn't like there wasn't enough room for the guy to wake up and break out.

More like he was just... sleeping? Probably?

Still, she made some headway, whatever soft earth remained slowly being excavated by little canine paws.

The more interesting thing was... the more she dug, the faster she dug, and the more her collar jingled..? The warmer the stone beneath her seemed to get. It was as though it resonated with the creature below. As if, slowly, it was awakening it. Eventually, each time the collar jingled, the stone nearly seemed to glow--no, it did glow, a soft ruby light emanating in flashes timed with the collar's sound.

How strange...

@Fleas

Fleas may have been stupid. She scraped at whatever dirt her jackal paws could reach, frantically trying to dig stone from stone. It seemed to be working--the stone was flashing! But her paws grew heavy with all that movement, and she was forced to stop and pant, sitting atop the chrysalis. That was strange. It wasn't glowing anymore. She tilted her head at the chrysalis beneath her. The collar chimed. The stone flashed. She looked down at the collar, then at the chrysalis. She tilted her head the other way. Another jingle. The stone flashed. Seconds passed in silence. The gears clunked together in her head with a shower of rust.

"Oh." Fleas said. She blinked. Were someone watching, she might've been embarassed. "Oh...alright then. I do this all the time anyways. Its time to wake up, Jester! Rise up!"

Fleas stood up, placing herself solidly on the rock besides the chrysalis. She dug her claws into the stone, as if preparing to enter battle. Fleas shook herself out. She would keep herself going for as long as she could, as long as it took to wake the jester, even as the slowly building dizziness threatened to knock her over.

"When I speak"
When I think

@Game Master Dark