Bat Got Que's Lung

Bat Got Que's Lung
Date of Scene:	12 December 2013
Location:	Forgotten Oasis
Synopsis:	Following a battle with a crocodile, Queegmaa is then visited by Echo, who shows a bit of compassion for his predicament. She explains that she 'got his back', so to speak, and for that matter, she probably almost got his lung, too, since his injuries were fairly grievous. After helping to bandage him up, he offers her a chance at researching a specific breed of monster, for whatever reason it was that Que had in his mind; this, of course, is to be left to the imaginations of the omniscient onlookers!
Cast of Characters:	Queegmaa, Echo

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Queegmaa has posed:
Queegmaa was not looking like his normal self today, for he'd come to the Pride Lands to investigate the rumors of diamond-veins in said realm. In the 'normal' world, Kony had used hundred of children as prepubescent-soldiers, as well as slaves who mined precious gems galore, but this had been an impossibility in the nexus that was part of the World of Ruin, because folks simply turned into animals when they made exodus to Africa! On the other hand, the green-troll was conniving and inventive enough to find a way around this little problem, and wished to test his theory, by trekking there himself. Upon reaching the Pride Lands, he morphed into a creature indigenuous to the territory, that being a Giant Nile Softshell.

He didn't know in advance what he'd become, but he anticipated it would've been some manner of turtle, being that kappa were already so close in physiology to the aforementioned creature. Here was the catch-- if he hadn't had his prosthetic appendages, he'd've been relatively helpless, terrestrially, in lieu of the fact that the Softshell had flippers instead of digits that allowed for manipulation of objects. Now, iron didn't automatically change into mud when one traversed into the Pride Lands, so the metallic limbs that were surgically grafted to his body managed to stay attached, albeit with less functionality because of the moderate shift in skeletal framework that differentiated a kappa from a fully fledged turtle.... the scapulas and the clavicles were /definitely/ different, which means Que's arms and leg didn't fit quite right. He was the same size, being of the largest breeds of turtles, but the neuro-transmitters didn't carry the signals from the brain and back with perfect efficiency.

This meant that he had to move a muscle in a certain direction, only to have the twitch react in a different way than expected. This was troublesome, especially since he'd come across a hungry croc in the oasis, who tried to make a meal out of him! Normally, a kappa with magic, a large dagger, and a partially bionic body would outmatch an organically grown reptilian without problem, since the predatory lizard trying to devour him was a crocodilian weighing upwards of only about eight hundred pounds. In this instance, he'd scarcely made it out intact, and this could be easily attested to by the fact that he had a number of wounds that had recently been barely stabilized, by way of self-applied first-aid, accompanied by a few 'drain' spells of Que's. All in all, though, that didn't mean he was back to being in prime condition; on the contrary, Queegmaa was lying next to a riverbank nursing his smaller injuries that hadn't needed immediate medical attention, and were too small for stitching, which instead, mandated the presence of simple bandages.

He was going to have some problems though, because he had some scratches on his hindquarters, and it would take him a lot longer to manipulate his robotic arms to bend in such a way that he could really fix up a spot that he could barely see. This was more of a disgrace than a detriment, since his gluteus had enough 'padding' that it probably would've sealed up on its own, with minimal blood-loss; his principal goal was to speed up the process with bandages.

Echo has posed:
Flapping down to the riverbank, was an enormous white furred... bat. There was no humanoid frame however, or dress, or any of those things, just a huge white animal bat, with accompanying fluffy fur ruff just under the neck, of course. The bat alights softly on the ground of the riverbank, having to use it's wings for balance on the ground, almost looking like it's 'walking' with the aid of them.

"Hey there, looks like you could need some help," came a feminine tone, apparently this was a femme bat, indeed it was Echo herself. "Did you get in a scrap with something?" she teeter totters a bit closer, walking on those wings again, though moreso looks like she's crawling a bit now. "Ugh, this place turns everyone into animals, how annoying~"

Queegmaa has posed:
Que hears the bat long before he sees her, but as a 'true' bat, perchance it was that Echo's auditory abilities now rivaled the kappa's.... On the other hand, maybe her ocular prowess left something to be desired, if she'd taken on the qualities of her morphological cousin. Watching her 'waddle' towards him after landing, he scoffed, amusedly, "Heh.... Ya plan ta help me when yant much more den a gimp s'well?" He shrugs, "If ya ken acksheeally git over here, then ya can put some patches on me.... But I dink ya'd tip o'er da sec datcha git close nuff ta me to duh sumdin yusful."

He turns his backside so that it faces the bat, and cants his head towards a dead crocodile, with its head twisted around at a one-hundred-eighty degree angle, with a thin stream of blood traveling down the side of its neck, where the skin had actually been broken. Evidently, Que's prosthetic limbs had given him enough might to snap the beast's neck, but not before the ex-kappa had been battered a smidgen. One had to wonder how strong his flesh was, though, for the steel segments of his being only accounted for what could move, whereas the organic portions were the anchoring for half of the bionics.... this implied that even had he not these editions to his natural self, he might've been able to tackle a monster weighing in at near half of a ton! There's a lot more about Queegmaa than meets the eye, and certainly the eyes of a bat! "Always bein' sent tuh dese stuhp't places cuz 'she' ain't wont to do't 'erself! Jus' as well, as I get 'sperience in da field, I's learnin' more dan she's. Now... dat dun explain why da hell you come ta dis Poltergeist-Forsaken place!"

Always paranoid, he turns his head to look over his shoulder at her some, with slightly narrowed eyes, obviously thinking it suspect that Echo arrived just as he was in a state of semi-vulnerability "Care ta enlighten inquirin' minds?"

Echo has posed:
Echo pulled herself around and looked at what he'd already done to patch himself, and tried to use her teeth to tug on the bandages that was already there to tighten them a bit. "Mmff, sorry, I only know magic to make things perish, not to fix things up," Echo huffed a little, her mouth temporarily full of bandage for a moment there, before pulling back. Her eyesight seemed to be decent as a bat, it would appear, though she had a lot of skin and fur around said eyes.

"Looks like you didn't have much trouble giving that poor guy a bad day, his last it looks like," Echo snickered a little, peering over him. "You've got your metal bits like this as well. So, what brings you here? were you in need of my assistance?" she asked, canting her bat head to the side.

Queegmaa has posed:
Que scratched his head, and remarks, "Well... I din sum'n ya dis time... so I dunno why you think I's needin' yer help, but I's fixin' tuh send a messenger to git 'holda ya.... Cuz I do need ta see if yer intristed in a job I got." He winces as she pulls the bandages taut, which in turn causes more contraction in his skin for better healing, but when jostled, opened flesh hurts, no matter how you slice it. The turtle waves a hand, "Kinda a nice coinseedence, ta've ya here at dis second. Maybe yuh got psychic powers yant 'ware of." He points, "Still wanna know why ya came ta dis place.... I mean, sure, people do happen ta cross padds in this weird amalagimateen of a cesspool, but even dough you din knowed I was here, ya'h tuh've come fer some reason, 'less ya were f'lawing me."

He closes an eye, squinting at the woman, "Dunno if ya been gittin' sloppy, er what... but I run inta Morrighan da udder day, 'n she says ta me dat she got ahold of yer name, and is plannin' ta undermine muh oprition. Hope you ain't spillin' as much as ya like ta leech, cuz da folks above me is less merceeiful dan I am....." He points a finger accusingly at her, "Shaduh loyeerds cud wipe duh floor widd yar sorry self!"

Echo has posed:
"Guess my ears are better than I thought then," Echo smirked a little, as much as a bat can smirk with her muzzle and all that, and gently preened back the fluff of dark hair she still retained in her full-bat form here. She didn't recoil back at the bandage being pulled and his reaction to it necessarily, she knew it'd hurt a little. "Was just on my way through and happen to come across you, is that bad?" she rolled her head about, as if rolling her eyes at him along with it.

"Oh, so she knows who I am now? well she can try and find me, if she wants, I suppose," she shrugged, more of a shrug of her shoulders and wings. "Silly, I AM a shadow lord now, so I know all about that," she grinned at him, an especially fangy one. "I guess no one told you, oh well," she clucked her tongue.

Queegmaa has posed:
Que snorted a little bit, with indignation and suspicion, "Hmmph.... I bet what you dun do, is ya smell da blood while ya happen ta be here, 'n then comes swoopin' down fer a free meal.... Well... Ya wan' it, ya kin have't." H says, as he grabs the fresh crocodile corpse by stretching out his elongated arm, and heaves it over towards Echo single-handedly-- for a non-shadow lord, he had some impressive tricks up his sleeve.... maybe it was his lack of belief in himself that helped Rakassa keep him down for so long.

Evidently, he wasn't scared of the bat, even as she admitted she had recently been inducted into the ranks of the Shadow Lords, who were clearly higher up the totem pole of combative-prowess than the kappa. He did raise a brow dubiously, clearing his throat, "Guess dere standards is lowerin', now dat dem loyeerds is losin' customers...." he probably was referring to some of their past defectors. "How'ver.... doubt ya knowed why's we been collectin' blood 'n udder sh*t, so whatever ya hears on da grapevine, ya way less informed dan ya think, says I!" He smirks, confidently, before folding his arms, "Fer a Shaduh Loyeerd, ya's awfully jenrus. I'd think yuh'd be wantin' ta off me suh you could gain favor widd Olivia, form an alliance. Mercy in sumdin dat them folks from da Bastion lihck ta practice, 'n I'm tryin' ta figar why I'm bein' helped."

Que grins, "I'm da middle-man, 'n if you was hired direc'ly un'er Olivia tuh do dese jobs, yuh'd be paid a lot better!" Which he was sure Echo already knew, despite the fact that there was a small chance tht Queegmaa could've been misguided in that belief. On the other hand, he suspected that Echo didn't yet know that Rakassa was Olivia's alter-ego, so he purposely didn't give out information pertaining to the Shadow Lord's rank within the Vectorite Navy. Whatever the case, he finally bobs his head back and forth, as he makes one modest remark as a concession, "Well.... Nobody dun tol' me, 'n sometimes I gets news a lil later dan e'ryone else, cuz I ain't oaffishlee part 'o Shaduh Loyrades.... So yeah, 'less yer lyin', den I'm gettin' da memo right now....."

Echo has posed:
"Well, there WAS that when I was over here," Echo peered at the softshell a little neutrally, licking her lips a bit and smacking them, still able to scent the blood in the air it would appear. Jumping up out of the way of the heaved carcass, Echo blinked and tug her teeth into it, tearing a bit away but suddenly becoming turned off by the leathery, flakey skin of the croc. "Blah, too tough," she cleaned her lips with her long, narrow pink tongue, before getting back to business as usual with the turtle. Err, Kappa.

"The elf knows nothing, you can use that material for whatever you want," Echo spat a little, a fleck of scaly skin having been dangling from her lower lip. "And perhaps, they have been a bit short-staffed as of late, apparently, your mistress is one of the main ones operating at the moment," she shrugged. "It's nothing to be worried about, I get around fast and all that. So, did you need me for something?"

Queegmaa has posed:
Que looks at the crocodilian, and cackles proudly, grasping the carcass firmly, and throwing it into the waters behind him, announcing, "I 'spose it'll do da fish sum gud. Dey eats that ding, and then multiples, den dere's more fish fer me.... I dun like da taste of croc, even dough it in nuh land-creature...." since Kappa preferred fish more than anything, being river-folk. "Short-staffed.... Yeah, da'd explain't. Only udder possibil'ty's datcha let one o' 'em guys f*ck ya raw." He winks at her, playfully. "I 'spect dat fer peoples intristed in fur't demi-hyoomeens, yuh'd prolly gi'em a good one, cuz what I sees is dat you got a lotta fire in ya!" Queegmaa finally relaxes a hair, deciding that there was a greater chance Echo wouldn't attack him than otherwise-- after all, if she did, she might have to answer to Rakassa, who didn't like her 'property' being damaged.

One of his hands had been holding his foot/flipper almost the whole time, and this might not have seemed like a big deal until he finally pulled it away, so he could get a glimpse of it. The flipper was missing some of the phalanges, which existed even in flippers, having evolved from toes in the days gone by; mayhap this was the reason why Que had strained himself to lift the gator corpse with one hand, instead of doing it much more easily with two, the weight of a one-handed throw had almost unbalanced him to the point that he might've fallen back into the river if he hadn't calibrated weight-distribution accurately! Evidently, Que's encounter with his assailant had now cost him a few toes, permanently, and was going to need yet /more/ machinery annexed to his body.

Nonchalantly, he doesn't bother to dramatize the ordeal, and proceeds with business, "I want yuh to go fight sum 'arpies.... Greek monsters.... kill sum, capture sum, 'n jus' plain follow sum aroun' ta study 'em. Dat's what I want outta ya." He nods then rolls his eyes, "Oh... Morrayigan dinks she knowed something... She acts rayle rude ta me, see.... so I start droppin' bread crumbs dat she kin du nuddin' widd, cuz she got nuh proof. I do't ta get un'er her skin, see, cuz she dar go'n deserve no less than dat!" He smiles boastfully, "See.... I says to her, when I leave her place, dat I see her soon, maybe on da 'marrow', and sudd'ly she gets mad 'n pulls a gun on me. She den tells me she knowed you, and dat she's already on ar trail.... I antagonize her 'n she den tells me what she knows, 'n what she's up tuh."

He folds his arms across his chest, no longer nursing his swollen flipper with the missing 'toes', as he elaborates further, "I beated da grass ta startle da snecks.... I kent know what she knowed les' I drow out a leetle bait." The kappa-turtle snickers, "Da whole time, I play dumb, while she loses 'er temper." From here, his lips turn from open-mouthed to a more tame grin, "She in smart lihck me, dough.... Cuz she dinks she gets rid o' me af'er dat. Well, I got somethin' up muh shell dat I kin do ta her tuh make sure she's outta my hair.... 'n hopefully outta yer's, too. So da way I see it...." he lowers his eyelids lazily, boredly, as if trying to insinuate that his upcoming opinion somehow transcended whatever beliefs she held, regarding financial arrangements, "....If ya dun do dis fer free.... den I shud least git a rebett, see?"

Echo has posed:
"Hardly, I'm an upstanding murderess, I assure you," Echo scoffed that she'd kissed up so to speak to get her position. Turns out the admission process was surprisingly friendly. "Fire in me? I got a lot of fire outside of me too, I tend to cause it," she nodded a little, ambling a little closer with her bat wing arms and feet, still cleaning her lips from the croc bits, she regretted taking a chunk out of it now, for sure.

"Huh, that thing took a chunk out of you it looks like too," she regarded the missing digits on Que's flipper queasily, then raised a furred brow. "Oh, the bone marrow, well apparently she figured out what it was I took," she shrugged. "She's got more brains than you thought," putting her wing arms down, she listened further. "We'll see, I'll see about your harpies, I don't do community service often, but," she shrugged with her wings, then flapped them, beating up dust and raising her into the sky. "Keep an eye on your pet elf, will you?" she called as she flapped pell mell away, as bats do.

Queegmaa has posed:
Queegmaa grumbles, "She prolly got more brains dan you, too, since she was able tuh figar it out, n' I was da one who hadda clue 'er in to da fact dat I was possibly part o' da whole eskpayde. I ain't gonna ask ya whatcha done wrong tuh make it so, but if she was conscious durin' da whole affair, den you got a lot ta learn 'bout 'stractin' things from yer victims and den knowin' ta dumpin' em in da middle of nowheres, so dey knows nuthin'." He says, as she takes off.

He doesn't know if she'll reply to it, or rightly care if she says anything in response, but he's skeptical that she is /quite/ as professional as she made herself out to be, being that the bat had probably toyed with Morrighan deliberately, for her own sense of personal entertainment. She was still one of the best the kappa could hire, all in all, because few would do such jobs to begin with, and have the skill to capture a former Shadow Lord, while on the other hand, she could still use room for improvement, in Que's mind.