Tunnel O has long been silent save for the occasional sound of footfall among the tunnel. Today, a new sound rises among the distant echoes cultivated by the tunnel's smooth, rippling walls. A series of cracks and groggy voices begin to emanate from a distant portion of the tunnel, but the origin of the voices is difficult to determine. Anybody who stumbles upon this noise might be inclined to track it down, but at the moment, it's difficult to tell whether the voices are friend or foe - and how many there are. What seems most obvious is that the voices aren't concerned with prying eyes and ears. Rather, they seem more concerned with one another.

Join This Quest

If you would like to participate in this quest, post with your character in this thread. Completing this quest will require some teamwork, so don't be afraid to roleplay it out! Feel free to request a GM when you feel you may be ready to proceed.

Participants:
Kin-Kin, Xireidi, Kyorai, Vega, Tukluk, Nkosana, Septiezal

Kin-Kin was raring to go today. She was simply dying to find someone new to admire her magic. Or at least some new place to train. Of course, Kin-Kin wouldn't suffer from a nice clear pond to make sure everything was looking as it should. As a result of these urges, the wolf had left Polaris of her own accord and was padding down the tunnel towards Pisces. Of course, the longer she wandered, the more her interest began to be piqued by the sound of distant voices.

Kin-Kin, having all the subtlety of a bomb filled with glitter, knew that wherever there were voices there would be someone to see her, admire her... maybe one would even ask for some advice from the magickal champion!

Listening out, she was unable to recognize any of the voices and it made her curious as to how she could have missed these other creatures before. They were being so loud. Perhaps she should be more cautious... If they were making this much noise, they couldn't be afraid of anyone, right?

Kin-Kin lifted her nose and sniffed the air, wondering if she could smell the speakers- and thus work out where they were. Perhaps she could introduce herself slowly, linger in the back of their vision until one noticed and came her way. By the sound of it, it would be difficult to simply jump in on the conversation anyway... Kin-Kin began to ponder what sort of a show the mysterious voices would appreciate.

Or perhaps... she could try to listen in. See what they were talking about. Thinking deeper into it, the wolf felt she might learn something useful. It was a win-win! The more she thought about it, the more she preferred that idea.

---

tagged:
ooc:
muse:

"Talking looks like this!"
Thinking looks like this...

Spending time in Polaris had been just what Xireidi had needed after hibernating for a couple cycles. Between meeting with new and old friends alike, feasting on the first meal in a long while, and soaking in the energy of the spire he was ready to continue on with his life. His magic still hadn't quite woken up and he wasn't sure if he should be concerned about that or not, but his first order of business was to go through the cave to try to figure out if anything had changed while he was out of commission.

Tunnel O felt... unpleasant, and not just because it brought up some difficult memories of his frantic search before hibernating. Between the wet atmosphere and the recent change in cave temperature the corridor he trudged through was unusually humid, prompting the now adult red wolf to pant as he paced along. A part of him wished he'd grabbed one of the ice sculptures to carry around to take an edge off the atmosphere.

Noise. Xireidi's ears perked immediately as he turned a corner and came within range of hearing... something further down the tunnels. It didn't seem to be down the route he was going to take to Pisces, but if he was here to update himself on the status of the caves this would be a good place to start.

Compared to most of his species is sense of smell was rubbish, and despite his adaptations his ability to spot things by sight was just about as bad. Having four out of five of his sense diminished though had left his hearing fairly solid as far as he could tell, and in this case that was likely the most useful thing to rely on.

---

"The words I speak"
The thoughts I hold
And the self I keep hidden away
tags: None
notes: None

Come on out of your dreams It was fun running circles around the same area. Surprisingly, with every place he revisited, there was something new he missed. Some things he could not believe sight went right over! Though, eyes were not a tool he should rely on heavily. Everything was dark once again, causing the pup to huff from the annoyance of vision's faultiness. He had been blind for a bit now, hopefully things will start to appear before him soon. Until sight was ready, smell and hearing reigned supreme for this time. While treading through Pisces once more, nose picked up on some form of dampness, figuring he was near the waterfall in which echoed this sector. However, it seemed off—completely off. Slowly approaching the tunnel mind began questioning, ears done their usual flickering at every sound they picked up on. This was not the same passage he traversed through before. It was something new to explore! Lightly wagging his tail, despite excitement, Kyorai carried on with caution as instincts knew better than his sense. Further within this tunnel the male stumbled across, he sniffed the air with each passing second, halting once he felt a checkpoint was reached. Then, ears realized a strange noise that started to fill them. Oh, were there other strangers here? No scent seemed to come forth, however, bringing the pup to draw close to a wall to know where he stood while he continued to search for some sort of distinct smell. It was quite the worry as the voices increased, but nothing was given in return for him. Although once Kyorai wandered around more, a scent faintly met his nostrils. Large ears propped up from the joy to come in finding at least one. Trotting his way near where smell drew stronger, he stopped once it got overwhelming, tuning his full attention to the voices in which surrounded. He was unaware that the one he found was just a few inches beside him, putting chin onto neck while he continued to silently listen. "Kyo Speaks"

VEGA

---

it had been a long time since he'd used his voice.

vega had been living in isolation for cycles now, traversing the caves in silence, the heavy and tense feeling in his temple replaced now by a cool, lonely feeling. it was relaxing, in a way, to be alone--he didn't really mind it, usually. but this had been an awfully long time, and now he wasn't quite sure he even knew how to talk anymore.

the wolf is a social animal, one who perishes alone and flourishes in a pack. vega had spent too much time alone, and now he was starting to hear voices?

they rung off the walls peppered with cracks and rumbles, echoing deep in the tunnel system like vega hadn't heard since he was a pup. perhaps this really was bad for him.

but as he slowly approached the direction of the sound, he began to smell the presence of other wolves, and behind him his tail gave an unconscious wag. he really was desperate for some interaction, wasn't he?

"hello?" he called into the tunnels, just loud enough to reverberate slightly on the cave walls. he wanted to howl, but that might drown out the mysterious noises, or even frighten them off, or startle them into attacking, or...

notes: this is rushed af im going to a party but i wanted IN

"speech" / thoughts
wolf by mark dumont / table by wulf

Sure, it was the holiday season, but that didn’t mean Tuck had to lay around being lazy. Today, he was out exploring a part of the Caves he couldn’t remember if he’d ever been in. It was a tunnel whose walls and corridors were unfamiliar to him. And there were weird echoing voices coming from… seemingly everywhere… Garmer, who was flying above him as usual, was just as confused as he was. There were others in the tunnel with him, but there were far too many voices to match the amount of Gembounds here. Or… maybe there weren’t that many? It was really hard to tell because the sounds bounced around all over the place.

I don’t like this, Garmer said, and there was a general feel of unease in his mind.

Mm, Tuck replied, trying to think. He hopped closer to the other Gembounds in the tunnel. “Do any of you know what’s going on? Where are these voices coming from?”

"Speech looks like this."
"Thoughts looks like this."
This is Garmer.


tags: here
notes: here
words: 162

Nkosana was walking between Polaris and Pisces when a noise caught his attention. His large ears flicked up, and he began to follow it. It was hard to tell where exactly where it was coming from, but he persisted. The noise-voices, it seemed-were quiet at first, but as he walked closer, they grew in volume. Looking around briefly, he noticed a few others approaching. After some time, he stopped. He couldn't track them any further. So he paused, looking around at the others. He heard one ask what was going on, although the fennec fox couldn't even see where the one who had spoken was. So he stayed quiet, as he did not know the answer.

He kept his ears up, trying to decipher the words, but there seemed to be too many of them. Or maybe there was only one? Perhaps the voice was echoing. He couldn't tell, and a part of that bothered him. They didn't seem to be hostile. In fact, they didn't seem to care about the gembounds who had gathered here. Flicking an ear, he sat down, still trying to decipher the voice.

Voices..

He barely felt them at first, but they trickled softly from the tunnel's mouth. Septiezal had came from Polaris. The blue light that flickered dramatically against his scales faded away as he crept further into Tunnel O. It wasn't curiosity that had driven him. It had more or less taken a backseat. Hunger was the factor that coaxed the reclusive python to slither towards the voices. Where there was speech, there was life, and were there was life, there was the possibility of prey. It was hard to pinpoint exactly where they were coming from. The noise seemed to echo all around him, but he was sure they were some where in this tunnel. So he slithered onward.

It was not long before Septiezal came across warm bodies, other Gembounds somewhat like him. Puzzled, he slid his tongue out curiously, tasting their scents. Septiezal recognized three. There was Tukluk again, with his flying kyte, and Kyorai, the little pup he met out of the chrysalis. Then there was that wolf he had not seen since he was a hatchling. They had never spoken to each other, but she was there when the Echoing Grays attacked them in Tunnel K. Suddenly, this scenario seemed all to familiar. The voices, the gathering of curious Gembounds. Where they about to be ambushed by mimicking rats? With that thought, all his hunger seemed to have been forgotten. Even though he had been controlling their population for cycles, that attack in Tunnel K had been traumatizing. But he was a large serpent now, capable of swallowing two cave deer in one sitting. He wasn't concerned for himself, but, as he dare say, for the smaller Gembounds in the area.

"Hey, Tukluk, Kyorai, what's going on?" He called out to the two familiar faces, slithering towards them. Perhaps they could shed some light on this mystery, and prove his speculation wrong. "These voices.. where are they coming from? What are they saying?"

__________________________________________________________

"Listen"
Tag: @Tukluk @Kyorai @anyone || OOC:

For the most part, it seemed the voices were unaware of the slow accumulation of Gembounds within the tunnel. They were talking amongst themselves - no, to those who were listening, they were quite obviously bickering. Their voices echoed through the tunnel, bouncing off the tunnel walls and back at them and out.

They hadn't even noticed the red wolf coming through the tunnel almost directly below the ledge where they were all sitting - still out of sight - when the argument began to mount, and a rock crashed over the edge towards the wolf. It might have been that someone was intended to be hit with the rock, as evidenced by a loud, audible scowl as the rock went tumbling down.

Perhaps someone should try to get their attention. It would likely take a pretty high roll...

Characters will have to make a roll to attempt to get the voices' attention. Only a high enough roll of the correct type will succeed.

@Kin-Kin @Xireidi @Kyorai @Vega @Tukluk @Nkosana @Septiezal

The caves around Xireidi filled with life as he honed in on the echoing sound and wordlessly moved forward. Some faces were quite familiar, some not so much, and a couple he had only seen from a distance in the past. While it was tempting to stop and greet the others he had gotten a pretty good lock on the sound and didn't want to break his concentration too much.

Before he knew it he managed to arrive as close as he was going to get to the source. The red wolf paused and listened closely to confirm it, but now he would require either wings or good luck with the natural rock formations to get any closer. A loud note rang out as pain shot through Xireidi's side, breaking his concentration in an instant.

In mindless reaction the wolf jumped back from the source of the loud noise, recognizing the near miss and not wanting to fall victim to a more direct hit. Unfortunately with the crowd that had formed the vector of his escape fell right in the line of a small pup who had wandered over. Xireidi let out a yelp as he was about to bowl over the innocent youth and ungracefully managed to change his course.

The course correction ended with Xireidi flying wildly toward another red wolf; smaller than him but still full grown and… glowing?

”Sorry Kin-Kin!” he yelled out as he crashed forward.

---

"The words I speak"
The thoughts I hold
And the self I keep hidden away
tags:
notes: None