"Do I wish - no one wants to get skinned!" Eythan was quick to interject, if only to make his series of sighs a trilogy and deliberately not give into the impetuousness that ran so hotly in his blood and made it boil over at times.

Rezik was caught up in a fretful dance, a strange desperation clutching him as he tried to drill home a fact that the gryphon wasn't interested in accepting. If the power of Masters were so absolute, what prevented them from just retaking it? Just proving once and for all? Eythan wanted to say as much, but merely ground his beak, considering how best to navigate this apparent minefield of a subject. He could simply walk along and keep his head down, but fuck that.

"Well - listen, you're probably well-aware of my opinion 'n shit," if the deer-guy was any good at reading tones and attitudes, "and I didn't come over here to talk about it. But, oh, well; they don't seem to need respect and obedience, now, anyways." So, no, Eythan didn't understand in the way that was wanted. "But, for both of our sakes, let's drop it, yeah?"

No harm, no foul, no regrets.

He paused, huffing and not apologizing - "if we're supposed to be guarding you, we may as well get to know each other." Gazing off in some distant direction for a moment, Eythan chirped, "anything you'd like to know about us?" Because, why not take the lead.

@Game Master Dark

The skull-like face parted into a horrified grimace, teeth bared. "You," said Rezik quietly, and there was a hollow ominousness to it that wasn't quite a threat, "will be the first to die."

"It was chaos--can you not understand that?" He looked around, slowly. "All day, every day--a mountain of the strongest eating the weak. Culling, shaping, killing--and the Masters at the top of it. But," he went on, and suddenly malice flickered through his face, and his haughtiness, his confidence, abruptly returned; "you would not understand the phrase 'needs must.' Do you 'Gembound' even kill-?" Disdain now shone in his eyes, and very deliberately, Rezik went for the rat instead. His teeth met delicately in its flesh, tendons pulling away like string, and as he chewed he stared hard at Eythan.

"'Drop it,' you say, and then ask me that question. You know nothing. You wish to know who I am; I am a survivor." It was given in a half-hiss, as if there were a threat in it, and he drew himself up with a bristle of the blue fur along his back. "Tell me, then, of your fools who live among the bones of the dead without understanding how they got that way."

@Eythan

Yeah, yeah, yeah, he'd be the first to die. Whatever. Eythan would deal with being dead when he... y'know, was.

Rezik was getting riled up anyways, and so was the gryphon. He should've known that this was going to go nowhere. "Well, considering I wasn't there for it, maybe not, bud," Eythan bit out, ears flickering back as he started to lose his composure and let his tongue flap a little looser, "but that's in the fuckin' past. Maybe letting everybody chill out and do whatever the fuck they want is the new strategy. It sounds a whole lot easier than wasting your time hunting everything down - huh?" Somehow, watching a flat-faced creature just bite off a hunk of rat was disgusting. Kinda like he should have some utensils or something to use. Eythan grimaced. "Usually, we aren't killing each other."

In a sort of temperamental way, the hybrid really wanted to sink his claws into this stupid deer and give him the what-for. But, unfortunately, there wasn't a need to fight or throw down. Then, the haughty fuck claimed to be a survivor, and Eythan took it as an out: "well, show me, then." He stood, pacing backwards a few steps. "Show me how you survived all of that strong-eat-weak and culling shit. I wanna see what it's all about, and then maybe I'll get it better."

He called out, "we understand plenty well who these bones belong to. They're all dead and gone. We don't know anyone they belonged to but that doesn't matter to us. We've all got ribs and spines and skulls and shit like that."

@Game Master Dark

Rezik's head snapped up at the challenge. His eyes narrowed, and his voice, previously heated, cooled to slow ice.

"Is that what you want, then-?" He took a step toward Eythan, slowly, and then another, leaving the rest of the rat behind. "You wish me to speak to Master Astraea-? To tell him the words you are saying? Because that," he went on, "is how I survive."

@Eythan

Eythan really had to fight the urge to guffaw at what this method of surviving was. It was tattling, clear as day. The equivalent of I'm telling mom, but with a certain pair of deer (and kinda-deer.)

The gryphon stomped on his own hind paw to keep himself from laying right into Rezik.

"Well," the hybrid began, in a tone that said he was not going to listen to his intelligent brain or paw-stomping, "I was implying a fight. A little spar. Some rough and tussling." Eythan narrowed his eyes, laughing mirthlessly, "listen - no total fuckin' disrespect to your Masters or anything. They could all fuck us up and ruin our days. Astraea sure did plopping you in our damn home."

Ah, fuck, step back - think about the bones and their wisdom -

"Fuckin' think you're all strong and shit, but ya don't even fight your own fuckin' battles."

@Game Master Dark

Rezik's eyes narrowed. "The only rule is survival."

He eyed Eythan--and then strode past him, though leaving space between them--and away.

Rezik exits, unless stopped

Pussy.

Let him go try and cry to Astraea.

The gryphon would deal with the situation when it came up - as in, he'd try to weasel his way out of any punishment if the whiny deer managed to spur the stag's favor and like - who knows, beg for this mean 'ol hybrid to get murdered.

Fuck, man.

Eythan glanced at the bones, narrowing his eyes and dramatically thinking their way, maybe you're wrong about this one.

exit