Lost In The Woods

Lost In The Woods
Date of Scene:	07 April 2013
Location:	Targ Woods
Synopsis:	Riku decides to go chasing after the Behemoth back into Targ Forest. He may just make a new friend.
Cast of Characters:	Riku, Eclipse Behemoth
Tinyplot:	Heart Of Power

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Eclipse Behemoth has posed:

The Behemoth was chased off into the Targ Woods. However the creature left behind a rather easy trail to follow. There was blood on the green forest ground and even some blood on some of the trees bark. The creature was clearly not doing well.

Even the fresh tracks of the Behemoth showed it wasn't exactly running straight and eventually the creature would be found laying there on the ground near a water pound. Breathing slowly, raggedly and not really moving.

Riku has posed:
Riku tracked the creature for a few miles before the trail started to become more meandering rather than a straight plowing course. He's no good at navigating a forest but he knows more than enough when flattened greenery, torn up earth and blood leave a trail about as stark as a scream in the closely packed woods.

He's not entirely fresh himself, although he didn't take the beating some of the other adventurers did. He's barely taken the time to do more than consume a potion and pull himself onwards because this creature was the ONLY link binding scary armor the sequel, the training exercise and Gabranth's disappearance.

It was tired and wounded and he didn't understand if it was so tied to darkness like it's attacks suggested why it's master didn't just open a portal to fetch it.

..It's about at that time that he remembers Judge Magister Zargabaath. He thumps a hand into his forehead. "..ugh. I'm an idiot." which seems to be a more and more recent refrain. He'll apologize to the Judge Magister later. Riku moves through the trees slowly, not even trying to sneak up on the behemoth because of all the noise he makes despite his best intentions.

He makes a wide circuit around the Behemoth once he spots them, staying way in case it tries to charge.

Eclipse Behemoth has posed:

The best someone gets that the Behemoth acknowledges knowing someone is around is an ear twitch and a tail 'thump' against the ground. There was a low growl as the Behemoth then tried to get up at the scent in the air. It tried to get up, but instead it howled in pain before thumping back to teraferma.

The massive creature clawed at the ground, snarling its teeth before hacking again, coughing out a bit of blood. It then tried to pull itself toward the water with little, to no success. The tail thumped again in annoyance. As those gold predatory eyes stared out at nothing with a few huffs of its breathe.

It really was in bad shape. The cuts were easy to see. The gashes over its body, a few even still gently dripping blood onto the ground.

Riku has posed:
Riku moved around to the front of the creature very slowly, especially since he was one of the attackers who gave it such grievous wounds. He does probably a very, dumb, thing ( a side adjunct to A Stupid Plan, copyrighted by Percival) and sheathes the weapon in his hands. "You really took a pounding, didn't you?" he pauses, awkward and confused as he pauses, almost says it out loud.. and then shakes his head. He takes out the healing salve that he got from Zeke and twists open the cap.

He sits down with the salve in hand and looks over the creature's wounds. Why hadn't it's master come to fetch it? Riku grimaces at a passing thought. ..Why should they care what happens to some random monster? They probably unleashed it on the camp believing it would be killed. That it survived and ran off probably has nothing to do at all with anything.

Riku sighs, muttering. "Damnit Gabranth.." to himself as he stays very still for awhile. Another cold lead. Another dead end. But he was already out here.. he couldn't just sit here and watch the thing suffer. So he lets the forest noises return before he moves slowly towards the Behemoth, ready to retreat at a moment's notice.

Eclipse Behemoth has posed:

The Behemoth growls as Riku gets closer. Snarling its teeth light an animal that is cornered; perhaps even frightened. The beast tries to move, perhaps move away from Riku. Its predator eyes locked onto the boy. It opens its mouth, huffing out air a few times, panting almost. Before snarling its teeth again.

Yet the head flops back down with a whimper before it gives up trying to get away. Its tail thumps the ground a few times and he just lays there. There was a soft muffled groan in pain from the creature before followed by a soft howl.

At least the Behemoth wasn't trying to harm Riku or putting up a fight, just seemed extremely frightened. Which was funny when you realize that this thing could just roll over and squish Riku.

Riku has posed:
"It's alright." Riku says in a quiet voice. "I'm not here to hurt you anymore." he takes his gloves off, getting a large scoop of the healing salve onto his fingers. "They just left you out here, didn't they? They took you from your home and just dropped you somewhere." Riku shakes his head.

"This is probably going to sting. Please don't take my head off. Although it is somewhat hollow, I am using it right now."

He makes himself as non threathening as possible, looking at the ground rather than at the behemoth until he was just.. barely within melee range. Then he knelt down and attempted to work the salve into some of the worst of the wounds. His reward? Probably get his head chewed off. Doing it anyways?

Sure. Why not.

He'd done stupider things.

Not many. But a few.

Eclipse Behemoth has posed:

The Behemoth continues to lay there, as Riku first approaches, the Behemoth starts to try and get away again. Snarling his teeth once more, even though he head was on the ground. There was also growling along with it. You know the growl that dogs do when they don't like how close you are getting.

Yet as Riku moves in closer and and asks the Behemoth to not take off his head. The Beast seems to calm down, as if he perhaps understands what Riku is requesting. Those glowing gold eyes also start to simmer down. The breathing calming a bit; though ragged.

When the salve was applied the Behemoth flinched. Teeth snarled, yet, the Behemoth remained. It didn't seem to fight Riku, perhaps it really /did/ understand. There was a soft whimper and a few soft huffs.

Before a deeply inhale, then a expel of air as the Beast seem just relax, beyond the muscles of the creature tensing when they were touched from where it hurt. The magic gently starting to take its work and mending the wounds.

Then the tail gently thumped the ground, before the Behemoth's ear twitched as a butterfly went to land on its ear. Slowly, carefully the Behemoth went to push itself. Those predatory eyes, not seeming so predatory now. Those gold eyes just staring at Riku for a moment, before the was a soft huff, then it flopped back over with a wolfish grunt.

Riku has posed:
Riku gives a small, close lipped smile as the behemoth seems to relax after he applies the healing salve to the worst wounds. "There. That's better." he tenatively puts a hand into the furred shoulder and then looks over at the nearby stream. "And this is the reason why I should have studied elemental magic." he tells the behemoth with a faint snort.

"Or at least engineering. But I think I can get some of that from there over here, and.. aha." There was a natural depression onto an armlength away. He shucked off his coat, dumping his canteen and some of the potion bottles into the leather lined depression.

"You need this more than I do." Riku focuses on these little problems right now to the exclusion of all else.

That he's talking to himself in a running monologue is just one more aspect of him trying to distract himself from the fact that he is squarely.. back at square 1 again.. and he doesn't really want to face that right now.

Eclipse Behemoth has posed:

The Behemoth snorts faintly at Riku's comment and rumbles softly. There was a faint huff of air, before the leather depression with water and potions was pushed over to the Behemoth. The beast stared down at it, then back at Riku, then down at the water.

There was a long stare at the water. Those gold eyes seeming to be looking into the water, before there was a low whimper, then a slight grunt. It seems to take the beast a bit to actually accept the very thing given to him, before he at last starts to lap up the water, slowly trying to sit himself in order to drink better.

The wind gentle moves through the trees, before the Behemoth's air twitches. Its head rearing up about then as it sniffs the air a few times. Closing its eyes as the window rushes by, and moves through his main, before he returns back to drinking the water once more until it is nearly gone. Actually almost to the point of pushing it into the pound.

Those gold eyes then look over to Riku, then the Behemoth huffs softly at the young lad.

Riku has posed:
Riku rubs the palm of his hand, the burn mark almost faded to nothing now by time and healing salve. He stares down into the slightly scarred surface, closing his eyes for a few moments as he hangs his head against his chest listening to the lapping noises.

He sits back on his hands and raises a hand, rubbing his closed eyes for a moment with a sigh that cuts off mid sound.

He blinks hard several times as if not exactly sure what stopped him. His eyes glimmer yellow all the way across, filling the iris as he squints at the behemoth, an overlay of watery shadow bathing the forest in dark tones. There was light here and there but the smear of light across his vision now was what he was staring at.

Riku stared up at the behemoth silently, brow furrowed and eyes searching as he slowly trailed his eyes over to meet the gold eyes of the behemoth. His mind froze and refused anything it was being told.

"..you stopped." he murmurs faintly. "..why did you stop?"

Eclipse Behemoth has posed:

The Behemoth stares back at Riku for a moment, before it takes it muzzle and then pushes the leather depression sack over to Riku. It actually moves a bit. Then stares at Riku again. Looks down at the depression, then at Riku.

Then it makes a soft barkish like sound, before a grunt. Then raises down it head to look up at Riku. Tail thumping on the ground as he stares at Riku. Then a soft snort, before he forces himself to rise up, shaking its body as a few loose scales fall down from its form. Before walking carefully, almost stubbornly, over to the pond before craning down its neck and then drinking from the pond water.

He stood there for awhile doing this. The beasts clawed pawed hands balancing close to the edge as he almost looked ready to fall in. Then after a few more lapse the Behemoth raises up its head before sniffing the air. He then pads over to Riku before there was a few huffs, then pushing its boney skull against the youth as if trying to Direct Riku in some direction. Then nipping its teeth carefully at his armor then giving a tug in the same direction as it walked around the youth.

Riku has posed:
Riku picked up the duster, shaking the last water from it before he throws it back over his shoulders. He watches the behemoth pull itself over to the pond to drink and his stare slowly becomes more and more like a glare. The mildly irritated glare of someone who is watching another push themselves too hard.

He shakes his head, rubbing his head and muttering something incomprehensible under his breath as he narrows yellow eyes at the 'guiding' nips and grumbles. "..alright.. alright, I'm going. I'm going." in a confused and bewildered voice.

He picks up one of the fallen scales, examining it for a moment before tucking it away in a pocket as he follows the behemoth and doesn't try to think too much about it. It was making for the great beginnings to a headache, right there.

Eclipse Behemoth has posed:

The Behemoth continues to lead the youth. Tugging if he slows down, nipping at him gently to keep him going. Though somewhere in all this, the Behemoth seems to slowly get distracted, those gold eyes trying to take on a predatory look again. There was a huffs and growl, and then a snap of teeth at some direction of the forest which seem to scare off some native wild life.

The Behemoth closed his eyes before exhaling some air, before continuing to move Riku along. Though seeming a bit more hastily about it, as if the boy was taking to long.

Soon though whatever it was, was coming into view. An old cabin that was still in decent shape, yet some vines grew along its lumber and the door had been knocked down. It seemed like it was abounded long ago.

Within was old wooden furniture, looked like a two bedroom cabin, and even had a kitchen with a place to cook food safely within. The Behemoth sat down outside the cabin, before pointing his muzzle toward the entrance, then looking down at Riku, before the beast's ears fixed themselves on Riku.

Riku has posed:
Riku is watching the behemoth very closely the entire journey. He watches their attention wander every so often, the forest noises growing quiet at the low growl. So for awhile it's just the sound of his feet chuffing through the forest leaf litter and the behemoth's heavy footfalls.

He only has to be tugged once before he keeps pace as just he can, navigating the forest carefully but still managing to jam his feet every so often. He seriously needed to learn how to move about without all but breaking his feet.

When they came to the ancient cabin, Riku just stares at it and walks all the way around the cabin before peering into one of the old shuttered windows at the abandoned furniture. He looks around for tracks or any signs that people have lived here but there wasn't anything he could see.

Dust lay thickly on every surface, undisturbed by the passage of others. Riku leaned against the wooden wall. "..So. This is where you wanted to lead me.." he looks in at the nearby door, knocked down and rotting slowly.

He stares at the behemoth silently for a long time. "Looks safe enough. Well." he snorts. "With a lot of work. It's not so bad, really." he waves it off and crosses his arms across his chest, feeling a vague twinge of distant pain as he continues to stare at the behemoth.

"..I know you." he murmurs very quietly as a lopsided smile creeps over his face. There is no humor in the expression.

Eclipse Behemoth has posed:

The Behemoth stares at Riku back, canting his head gently. Those ears twitch a bit, but the Behemoth just keeps his head canted. Yet those eyes for a moment start to fade slowly to a more primitive state. It was as if watching slowly something being pulled back into the depths of the mind. The ears twitch again, before The Behemoth looks off to the distance, away from Riku.

Soon the massive beast stands up and seems to continue to stare in a direction. Then starts to pad off that way. The tail dragging low, before suddenly there was a low growl, and then a roar, before the Behemoth charged into the forest.

Soon several birds can be heard squawking and carrying on. Flying out of there area. There was also a sound of something squealing in pain before everything goes silent again.

Riku has posed:
Riku raises the fingers of his hand as if in the beginning of unfolding his arm to reach out, and then slowly refolds his arms. He looks around at the forest and walks over the shattered door into the cabin.

His hands brush away cobwebs as he looks through the dusty and abandoned rooms. He blinks very rapidly as he stares down at the creaking floorboards and then up at the rooftops. It looked sturdy enough, if dusty and timeworn.

Riku walks around the perimeter of the cabin again, using some of the sturdier vines and a nearby tree to get him up on the rooftop overlooking the forest. He considers the linkpearl for a moment and then puts it back without using it, he instead gets out his journal and flips the pages.

He looks at the semi decent sketch of the behemoth done by sightings and vague information.

He flips the page, and a pencil hovers above the paper as Riku stares down at it.

A shadow slowly grows to engulf the pages as Riku slowly leans over the open journal, pressing his forehead to the white pages silently and covering his head with his arms.