Kalama's returned to consciousness slowly, as if she were drifting in a sea of tar. She would open her eyes, the world just as dark as before, and she'd be lost in her unconsciousness once more. The cycle kept going for many days longer than Kalama had thought to process. Until she finally managed to grip onto her awareness. She would not let it go. She erupted into an abrupt frenzy of movement. her claws tapping against the hard stone, and her flight feathers hitting the flint walls with a barely audible pat. Something else she didn't recognize knocked against the walls, clumsy. Kalama was too confused and exhausted to entertain the thought of what it was.

She paused in her assault against the rock walls surrounding her, heart beating hard, and chest pounding with the strain of exercising muscles days away from atrophy. Wait. She realized something, there were walls. Her ledge wasn't this small. Walls? Where was she? What had happened to her? She tried to reflect on what had happened, but her thoughts were at best were murky, flashes of washed out color and sudden pain, or simply not there. Her breathing got heavier, the thin, stale air within the claustrophobic stone walls doing nothing to calm her growing panic.

She wanted out. She thrashed against the chrysalis repeatedly. The stone seemed more resilient than Kalama's muscles could handle. But her will was more powerful than her body. Her legs must have made a crack at some point, for at some point one of her claws struck air. Fresh air. And with it came blinding light. Bright sparkling light. She squinted her eyes, and moved her foot in an attempt to cover the hole, only crumbling her chrysalis further. And the light flooded in. Light in a myriad of colors flooded in, but all blazing with the same headache inducing intensity. Why was it so bright?
Before long, Kalama was left by herself, exposed to freezing air and blinding light. But she could breathe now. At least she could breath. She sat upon a crumble of flint and... . She looked down. Shiny gold stones. She twitched a foot, a raptorial claw on her innermost toe tapped the shiny stones. Kalama didn't think much on it, but that claw had always been there, she was pretty sure of it.

"What?" She croaked, her voice a hoarse whine. Even her beak felt different. It didnt align as good. It felt like she'd gotten a bunch of seeds stuck in her gums again. She wasn't even sure how she was managing to close it. She tucked her wings in close, noting the uncomfortable growths poking her in the feathers, and picked up the closest stone with her beak. She bit down on it, hoping to force the seeds from her gums.


Speech. Thought

@Dread
@Bug

((I like the rolling to break out of chrysalis thing so im stealin it here))

Dread was sweeping in for a landing, his wings beating their slow bass thump--hind legs reaching talons for his ledge--when he spotted something amiss.

Darting eyes took in the shattered flint--and the living chicken. Atop his head, the dragon-kitten leaned forward, her own wings spread where she clung to his horns, and hopped off; Dread barked a warning at her.

"BE CAREFUL," he boomed, uncertain if the chicken might attack his strange child. He rocked forward as his full weight landed in his den, wings serving as forelegs, and then craned his neck--all the spines along it rising warily--to inspect Kalama. "YOU TURNED INTO A ROCK," he informed her, accusingly. It took him a moment to realize that she looked different. "You look DIFFERENT."

Bug was happily clinging to her father's head, wings spread to vicariously taste the wind. She still had trouble with some of Monoceros' rougher winds and anyway, she liked the company and the sharing of the flight with the dragon.

She, too, spotted the difference in the hoard--though only a few moments after Dread did. She perked up, about to bound to great Kalama, when her father's warning boomed. Does he mean me-? She glanced at him, and decided that he must; there seemed to be nothing to warn the bird against. He must be warning me about--that? Bug ventured, peering at Kalama.

"Hello," she offered, in the small voice of a friendly, but shy, child. She lingered back of her own accord, though her eyes sparkled; she'd never, in her life, met another Gembound before. Kalama was her first stranger, and she was both excited, and afraid, to meet her.

In an awed near-whisper, she added: "I'm Bug!"

@Kalama

Kalama paused in the midst the hard stone she was chewing on, and spat it to the side. "Why should I be careful? I've chewed rocks before." She said, annoyed. memories of the past events came flooding back. She rocketed up, swaying unsteadily for a moment on her feet and flapping for balance. "It's you!" She shouted. "Rock!" Her feathers lashed behind her like the tail of an angry cat. She wasn't sure when her feathers "You didn't win! I won! I let you win!" She tilted her head for a moment. Dread brought up some strange nonsense about her turning into a rock. That didn't make sense, unless the egg fairy had turned her into a giant egg.

"I didn't turn into a rock, thats dumb." She looked down at the shards of brown stone at her feet. Eggshell. Even more proof the egg fairy was alive and out there. "The egg fairy just helped me take a nap, ro--." She froze in her thoughts. The gears in her head were turning once more. She had taken a nap after being mean to Dread. Maybe, this time she was not mean, and was nice instead. Like Eythan had taught her. "Dread." She said. The word ended with a half-hidden annoyed hiss. What did Dread mean she looked different? She stared at her legs. "My claws are bigger and I've got weird seeds stuck in my gums and wings, but everything else is the same. There's nothing different about me, Dread." She bit down the desire to call Dread dumb once more. Within each sentence the chicken spoke, thinly veiled annoyance lurked.

She squinted at him, shielding her vision with a wing. "You look the same, not rock. Why do you have so many bright things in here?" She looked around, and pointed a wing at a carving of something she couldn't quite make out. "Get more dull things, like this thing."

She looked back up at Dread's head, and noticed something fuzzy moving. At first Kalama thought her vision was going bad, too after the Egg Nap, and that's when she noticed the cat upon its head. Since when were Dread and that cat friends? She remembered it from a while ago. There was a Bonebound meeting or something, and the cat had touched her nose. The furball called itself Wouder, or Wielder, perhaps. Wielder sounded right, she thought.

She wasn't sure when Wielder had grown wings, but maybe staying around Dread gave you free wings. Would she get two pairs of wings? And then the cat spoke. It didn't sound much like Wielder, perhaphs there was a legion of Wielders? The thought annoyed her. "What do you wa--"She stopped herself. Kalama was nice today. She did not like getting bit by Dread, she reminded herself. She started over again. "Hi, furball. I am Kalama, conqueror of caves and the immortal guardian of the Bonebound." She stretched up taller on her feet, attempting to look Impressive. The cat clearly thought she was cool--Kalama herself was well aware she was cool--so she would, atleast, attempt to look cool.

Speech. Thought

@Bug

Dread watched, impassive, as Kalama spoke. Her logic made no sense. She'd changed. She admitted she'd changed. He felt irritation threatening again to rise in him, but gave it up fairly quickly; he could not be bothered, really, trying to eat her again. He hadn't wanted to, anyway; she'd kept attacking him and saying stuff about killing him, and magic, he knew, was unpredictable. For now he simply glanced briefly at his hoard at her remark. He was about to retort that he liked shiny things, and then he remembered that Kalama was mean as hell, and might come back and steal his shinies later. In a rare, if fleeting, moment of wisdom, then, he kept his mouth firmly shut.

He drew closer, though, looming over Bug while staring down at Kalama--not speaking but hovering, in a sense. He did not want the chicken-... thing... attacking his tiny child, and he stayed close enough to make it clear that if she did, he was there to intervene.

But thus far, she wasn't making any threats; and so he just waited, silent, and watching.

Bug's eyes widened. She'd never have thought of talking back to Dread that way--she'd never had a need to--but Kalama's words didn't really strike her as insulting. Instead, they were bold, and her declarations of her titles only impressed the tiny hybrid more.

Tiny paws touching the rock carefully, she crept forward, staring in awe at the bird-creature.

"You are?!" she asked, excitedly. "What caves did you. Um. Conqueror? What's a Bonebound?"

Bug's experience was limited--she was a tiny child who had lived her entire life in the not-very-worldly single ceiling-height lair of a dragon who had, at best, a tenuous grasp of language and general things. So to her, Kalama must not only have been telling the truth, but must have been a true warrior indeed!

After a moment's blinking consideration, the dragon-kitten then added to her list of questions: "What's an egg fairy? Dad didn't tell me about an egg fairy!" Eager excitement laced her tiny features. Whatever the Egg Fairy was, she wanted to know all about it.

@Kalama

Kalama backed up a few steps, composure gone, suprised that the little kitten . She hadn't expected the little kitten to take to her boasting so easily, but it boosted her already oversized ego. She darted her eyes up to Dread, making sure the much more intimidating dragon wouldn't try anything. She didn't like the dragon so close, and backed up a few more steps before speaking. "What caves have I conquered?" Kalama clacked her claws, wagging her tail in thought. "Well, I've been to most of them. It's hard to remember so many, when you've seen as much as me." She puffed up her ruff of feathers, clearly pleased with herself.

"The Bonebound are uh," She was quiet for a moment, tapping her beak with a wing. She'd never given much thought to what they did. She just did the protecting. "They're a group of gembound that like sniffing bones, and I protect the bone sniffers. No ones ever been harmed under my watch."


"Oh, the egg fairy?" Kalama's voice became hushed and excited. "You haven't heard of them? Y'know how you go to sleep sometimes and you wake up with a free snack? The egg fairy does that! Its usually kinda round and brown looking. They only do it while you're sleeping for some reason, but I know ill catch 'em someday. I'm not sure why the egg fairy hasn't visited you, though."

She flicked a wary eye up back up towards Dread, and then back down to Bug. She didn't like his silence, but threatening Bug's... mentor? Dad? Babysitter? Whatever they were, snapping at them would probably lose Kalama her small, fuzzy audience for her rapidly snowballing ego. "Oh! Maybe you're not strong enough. I think you gotta be stronger to have the egg fairy visit you." She nodded to herself. Yeah, that seemed about right to Kalama.

Speech. Thought

@Bug

Indulging the curiosity of a child was often liable to test one's patience. Dread, watching above, did not react to any of it but kept a careful eye; perhaps he was amused, though, (or perhaps not) at the barrage of questions that followed Kalama's statements.

"Ooh! What are the caves like?! Are there any--any WHITE ones? Any with glowing things in?!"
"...Why do they sniff bones?" (And Bug's nose wrinkled up here.)
"Why would anyone want to hurt bone-sniffers?" (The nose-crinkling increased.)
"Why does the egg fairy leave snacks?" and "Why do you want to catch them?"
"How do I know if I'm strong enough?" Bug's nose relaxed as she looked down at herself, and back up. "What do I have to do to be strong?"

"I can do magic," Bug then offered, breaking her question-streak with an offer both tentative and proud. She squinted again, calling up the single, not-very-"strong" spell that she knew, and her voice seemed to whisper through the den: "Like this! Is magic strong?" And Bug peered hopefully at Kalama, apparently her new idol.

@Kalama

Kalama was taken aback by the sheer amount of questions. She could count on one foot the amount of times she'd felt true fear, and this was another tally to add. She had to wonder how the kitten had enough breath in her to say all that without a pause. "I-I cant answer all of your questions. Conquerors like me are pretty busy." She sniffed. "Ill answer some though."

The ones she could remember well enough, anyways. She tapped a toe. "Well, I've seen a cave with glowy mushrooms, I don't know about white caves though. Oh, theres one filled with mist!" She hummed in thought, trying her best to remember what else the Kitten said. "The bone sniffers live in a bone cave. I don't know why people wanna hurt bone sniffers, but I'm just there to stop all that. Maybe they get jealous of them. I haven't found out why the egg fairy keeps leaving me free snacks either, but that's why I'm gonna find them." She said. "The egg fairy thinks they're so crafty--well they can only give me the slip so many times. I'll lasso them in one way or another."

To be strong.Kalama barked a laugh at Bug's show of magicka. "Magicka isn't strength, obviously. True strength is physical. You have to train and fight. Like me! I've fought a buncha things." She hadn't won most--if any of them, but she sure had been in them."I could teach you!" She said and then immediately regretted. It'd mean spending more time around the giant smelly rock called Dread. "But... I'm pretty busy most of the time. Like right now."

She began to back off the weird pile of treasure. The Bug cat monster was okay, but Kalama was very busy. She had a tunnel to go check, and training to do. She was tired of her body being so ungainly after her egg nap.
Speech. Thought

@Bug

Dread remained very, very quiet, his eyes closely tracking Kalama, the rest of his body completely still. It wasn't a relaxed stillness, either; it was tensed, ready to move if provoked--but the chicken just spoke, and he did not interrupt.

Until, that is, there was a need for fatherly input.

"You are very strong," he interrupted--quietly, for once--to reassure his very tiny child. "But you have to do things for the strength to come out. It is not all fighting," he added, eyeing Kalama, and suppressed the urge to add that if it were, smaller Gembound would always be weakest; he knew it wasn't true, and so magic was obviously strength of its own. "Magic can be strong."

He then crept a little further into the den, crowding it, inhaling deeply as he leaned toward Kalama. When his jaws opened, what appeared--in a cheerful flash--wasn't a bright incinerating flame, but a shining banana that plopped on the floor.

It bounced once.

Dread then stepped very slowly back, still not taking his eyes from the chicken.