| Logs |
2004 July 11
| Idlewild |
| Realms |
Retired
| Reality Fault |
General Info
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| Realms: Idlewild Logs |
July 11
The Fall elves, or at least the Fall border guards, live in a series of one-room treehouses strung widely out high above the forest floor. Hidden by the leafy canopy and protected from ground predators by both clever camouflage at the lowest levels and roll-up rope ladders for access, it's surely a safe way to live-- if you don't mind heights. After sharing an evening meal with Robin and Kees-- both elves in shades of brown save for grey-blue eyes on the taller Kees-- the party is shown to rooms for sleeping. Zhi and Kip lead Aiden, Sol and Seodil off to one; Badger Mattress, still wearing her fur hat, leads Steven, Lotte and Lauren off to another, explaining that no one room for sleeping is really big enough for all of them at once. Ghost and the horses cannot climb the rope ladder, and so must sleep on the forest floor.
The way to the octagonal room is via a narrow wooden pathway of steps and, sometimes, branches. It does have rope railings, at least, and in the dark it's too far to the ground to really see how distant the forest floor actually is. The sleeping-room itself has rolls of reasonably comfortable pads for lying upon-- nothing like the Pink Velvet mattresses, but then this is not what some would call civilization..
Lotte passes out upon lying down, the excitement of the day being too much for her.
Steven considers if the other three will have any sort of sleep, considering all that usually needs talking out between them. He does his evening and, when he awakens, morning exercises and meditations as quietly as he can.
Lotte awakens as Steven is beginning his meditations and lays quietly until he is done. Then she practices on her guitar for a bit.
Lauren sleeps a bit uneasily, mostly from the hard floor and the heights, and is up very early again looking bleary. "Morning, Steven," she marmbles at the blurry kata. "Morning Lotte."
Lotte nods to Lauren. "Mornin'."
Steven says easily, "Good morning, Lauren." He is not a morning person, but he is rather awake at this point, so he tries not to sound TOO awake.
"Stupid trees," Lauren grumbles to nobody in particular. "Where's the ladder? I need to get out of this hutch."
A plaintive yip sounds from below... somewhere on the forest floor.
Lauren discovers the ladder easily enough when looking; it's a big, thick roll of rope and wooden rungs. Heavy, too. A door is set into the wall to keep sleepers from falling out the exit overnight.
Lotte finishes up her practice and goes out to see what the yip was all about.
Morning is feeling more refreshing here, to Steven, than it has in weeks... no ghosts, no urgent mission, and something in him actually likes being up almost in the sky. The air feels crisp and clean.
Lauren gives the ladder a good kick to unroll it down the hatch and sticks her head down there. Yip?
Steven says, "Sure thing!"
Steven blinks, in the middle of a gesture. "What was that?" he asks, moving to the edge to look down.
When Lotte starts to go out, she sees what Lauren sees, looking down-- they're a hundred feet up. Suddenly it feels a little like the treehouse room is swaying. Just a little.
Down below, on the ground at the base of the tree, a silvery grey wolf stands with Crenshaw and Swift. It must have been Ghost that yipped.
Lauren gets pale and shaky and flattens herself to the floor at once. She wriggles back, VERY carefully, from the hatch.
Moopy pops into existence-- to Lauren, anyway-- and says brightly "Wow, Boss, we are REALLY HIGH UP."
Steven blinks a little, glancing over to Lauren as she shrinks back. He shrugs a little, and starts to make his way down the ladder to see how the three down there are doing.
"Shut UP, Moops," Lauren snaps, eyes squinched shut. "Um. Down. Shut DOWN."
Lauren keens piteously. "Steven? The ladder's strong, right? REALLY strong? Is there somebody down there to catch people if they fall?"
Steven, lacking a fear of heights, navigates the ladder down quite successfully and without falling off to a horrible, thuddy death. Crenshaw squints at him when he gets to the ground and says, "Well. That looks interesting. Sleep well? I always thought the air might be thinner up there." Swift prances a little in place and says, "Is my lady Lotte awake? I could use brushing. I am not at my most glossy."
Ghost says, as usual, nothing. She waves her tail gently.
Moops says, "I can't look. Did Steven die?"
Lauren nods. "He's dead, little guy."
Moopy says, "Neat. Splattered? Is it all gruesome? How big a mess did it make? Do you think you'll make a smaller one or the same size?"
The orange floating squid adds cheerfully, "I bet there's blood everywhere. I wonder if he has more blood in him than you do because he's bigger."
Steven glances up. "Oh, it was a good sleep... air's not too thin up there..." Almost impulsively he scratches Ghost behind her ears. "Yes, Lotte's up there, as is Lauren. Uhm.. I don't think Lauren wants to come down just yet...." He looks up and calls, "It's all right, Lauren! I made it down, the ladder's strong, and I'm... reasonably sure someone down here will try to..." Break your fall.... "To catch you...."
Lauren grits her teeth. "Don't make me throw you out the window. I'm going, all right?" All tense and twitchy, Lauren backs her hiney to the hatch, flails with a foot until she catches a rung, and starts a slow, laborious climb down interrupted several times by pauses to clutch the ladder like a vise when a breath of wind makes it sway.
Inch by inch, Lauren finally makes it to the ground, and does a very accurate pantomime of clutching some floppy object from the air and shaking the ever-loving hell out of it. "Thank...you....Steven..." she says, still abusing the air.
Moopy wails, shaken like a helium-filled bobble toy, "What did I doooo?"
Ghost brushes her head against Steven's leg companionably, grateful for the ear-scratch.
Lotte has been staring down to the forest floor with a rather bewildered expression on her face. When she hears Swift complaining, she snaps back to reality and calls down. "I'll be down in a second..." She gives the ladder a look and then shimmies down as fast as she can, a shiver going through her body when she reaches solid ground.
Steven smiles quietly to Lauren. "Welcome." He wonders what that little pantomime was all about, but is used to gestures like that from her by now. He frowns a bit at it, though.
"MEH," Lauren snarls, plopping Moopy down on her head with finality. "I don't even remember climbing that ladder--how could we have got up so high? I'm sleeping down here tonight."
Crenshaw greets her rider, "You are not so keen on heights. I'm surprised they got you up there. You might want to work on that so it doesn't kill you-- I mean, good job. Er. Good job there just then. You'll do fine with practice."
Lauren meanders over to give Crenshaw a sour look before Crenshaw's basic pony-ness overwhelms Lauren's urge to smack her. She gets a forelock-scritching instead. "So...um. What's going on today?"
Swift prances closer to Lotte as soon as she touches the ground, tossing his blue-grey mane proudly. In a not very quiet voice, he says happily, "I see that you are not afraid of great falls and drops. Brave Lotte. I am unsurprised at this nobility of spirit."
Ghost just sighs, suspiciously relieved-looking, and waves her tail at Lotte, wolf-smiling with parted jaws.
"Lotte," Lauren calls out with renewed cheer, "I'm going to strangle your goddamn horse."
Lotte chuckles and says, "Yes, I put on a good show, don't I? I'm afraid I can't brush you today, my dear, because I do not own a brush." She shrugs and gives Ghost a hug and a scratch.
Swift says haughtily, "You are not of sufficient height to strangle me. Want a ladder?" before Lotte's attention distracts him and he makes a quiet, happy horse whuffle. "Oh, well. Perhaps the good elves here can supply one, hmm? Although I will trample the twins if I see them."
Crenshaw says, "I think that's a good idea. Today's plan can be to go kick elves. Strawberry blonde ones."
Lauren nods. "I like that idea...I like it a LOT. And we can give Swift a blue one to kick, since he's so big and smart."
Lauren is completely deadpan when she says this. She so is.
Ghost leans into Lotte's hug with dignity, then very nearly laughs at Lauren. The wolf tilts her head at the bard, eyes bright, and looks as though she looks as though she would like to add something to the conversation, if only she could talk.
Steven smiles a bit, then leans against the tree, stretching. "So, have our hosts come by yet this morning?" he asks. Some part of him wonders where they got the name 'Badger Matress' from....
Swift sounds approving. To Lotte, he says "Your small companion does not have a bad idea, this time. We could do that."
Crenshaw looks at Steven. "I haven't seen anyone but Linden. Odd little thing. We were eating the hay together last night that the fur-hat elf brought us."
Lauren pats Crenshaw's neck, and straightens Moopy on her head. She's about to make an announcement about the elf-kicking schedule before the bit about hay makes her blink. "Um. What? She eats HAY? You guys hear that? Linden's a real deer."
Lauren's peach-colored horse adds, "And Linden bounded off this morning when she saw other deer... I think she's gone native. Fast work."
Swift says with a touch of scorn, "Of course she's a real deer. You silly person."
Steven blinks in surprise at that. He opens his mouth.. then closes it at Swift's comment. No need to get any of that venom directed at him.
Somebody with long brown hair begins the descent from the ladder above.
Lauren lights into Swift. "She's NOT a real deer she's an ELF and you should KNOW BETTER you STUPID RUMINANT, I mean it's not as though DEER HAVE FOUR LEGS or ANTLERS or HOOVES or anything, oh NO, suddenly anybody who says they're a deer can just be a real deer and that's that? Well I'M A GODDAMN ORYX!"
Swift shakes his tail and says, "She has four legs. And hooves. You haven't been paying attention." He sounds vaguely pitying, and quite serene. "You have to look at the right times."
Lauren blinks. "Were...were-deer?"
Crenshaw says, "What's an oryx?" Kip, jumping off the last few feet of the ladder, nods to the group and says, "What the horse said. Oryx? Do we have a predator problem?"
Swift gets a devilish gleam in his eye and looks straight at Lauren. "I don't know where the deer are. Haven't seen her since dawn."
Lauren switches topics with aplomb. "'Course, Kip." she explains. "They're about this tall--" she holds up her hand a little over her own head-- "and they have pointy ears and strawberry-blonde hair."
Steven tries not to think of what a predatory, carnivorous oryx could be.
Kip gives Lauren a rather odd look.
Moopy says, "Boss, he totally thought that was hot. Do it again."
Lauren pokes Steven in the arm. "C'mon. Tell him. S'true."
Kip says, "Those aren't oryx. Those are idiots."
Lauren mumbles something sheepinsh about calling them oryx where she's from, and busies herself making braids out of Crenshaw's mane.
Steven blinks to Lauren. "Er... I thought an Oryx was a kind of -- er, right.... Uhm... so, what, ah, will be done today?
Lauren says, "Um, I really DID like the kicking idea. I did."
Tactfully, Kip pulls leaf-wrapped bundles out of a small brown satchel slung over one shoulder and offers them generally around. "Anyone hungry? --Whatever you want to do, Steven. Zhi wants to rest here for awhile before we go farther in, give everyone a chance to breathe. And Badger Mattress really wants to talk to you all. Aiden and his lovers have already eaten, they're off on a walk or something, said don't worry about them, they may be gone a few days. It's safe here. If you'd like, I can show you places to walk, or relax." He smiles easily.
Lauren claims a leaf-bundle and gets goggle-eyed at Kip while he's looking in other directions. He looks even prettier when he's relaxed...
Lotte nods. "Yes, I'm hungry." She pauses. "Gone a few days? Oh." She frowns.
Lauren finds that her leaf-bundle unwraps to reveal smoked meat and dried apple slices.
Steven nods, accepting the bundle gratefully. "Thank you. Yes, I'm a bit hungry -- er, a few days?
Kip's voice is gentle as he nods back to Lotte, handing her a leaf-bundle. "They needed to be by themselves for a time, I think."
Lauren groans and picks the jerky chunks off the apples, resulting in a disappointingly small pile. She eats it anyway.
Lotte nods again. "I definitely agree." She takes the bundle and unwraps it.
Brushing long, dark brown hair back behind one ear, Kip says "Aiden is... not doing well with surprises. I could strangle the twins." He scowls. "I agree, too. Maybe a few days of soothing and no loud noises will help."
Lotte's bundle contains the same at Lauren's and Steven's-- dried apple and smoked meat.
Lotte picks off the jerky and hands the apples to Lauren.
Steven nibbles at the rather tasty trail fare, nodding to Kip. "Some quiet time would be good. I don't mind. What does Badger... want to talk with us about?" For the life of him, may his techer forgive him, but he can't say her full name without cracking a smile.
Kip notices the picky eating and looks at Lauren and Lotte. Almost shyly, he says "...Would you like to go berry-picking first thing? If you're hungry still? We can do that."
Lauren looks pathetically grateful. "Oh, PLEASE. I love berries. They do too." She assumes Steven and Lotte also love beries--any sensible human-elf hybrid would.
Lauren munches Lotte's apples, and offers a leaf-ful of jerky in return.
Lotte swaps apples for jerky and starts eating. She chews thoughtfully, swallows, then says, "Sure."
To Steven, Kip shrugs and says, "She's a few rabbits short of a stew if you ask me. She was talking about being able to see through you, and that you in particular--" he pokes a finger at Steven without making contact-- "are being followed by nuns."
Thoughtfully, Kip asks "Are nuns like oryx?"
Lauren spends a few seconds coughing up a chunk of half-chewed apple, after trying to snort a laugh and choking herself on it instead.
The slight brown-haired elf starts walking, strolling more than going anywhere fast. "Talk as we go? Berries are this way." He stops and gives Lauren a concerned look. "Is she alright?"
Steven blinks at Kip . "Er, nuns? No, they're.... uhm... it's kind of hard to explain.... They're...." He looks to Lauren and Lotte for help.
Lotte has no idea what an oryx is, but is pretty sure it's nothing like a nun. "I think perhaps an oryx is not much like a nun at all," she offers.
*HACK* "...fine.." *hack wheeeze snort* "M'fine..." Lauren catches her breath again.
Kip looks rather puzzled, and walks on for a few minutes before suggesting, "We could hunt for nuns... after the berries? If they're following Steven, and might become a nuisance?"
Steven coughs a bit. "Nono, a nun is a... person devoted to a god, a woman in particular...." he blinks. "Did.. she say what they were? I mean... if they were human, or elves...?
Lotte giggles. "Nuns aren't worth hunting. We could track them, though. See what they want."
Steven is thinking back to the tree-person he met during one of his earlier visions, and the one he met in the bazaar, both devoted to Pelor. It sort of makes sense, being in a forest like this... Perhaps that''s what Badger Matress was thinking of....
Kip shakes his head at Steven, "Not sure... the god Orphanage? Is that a god you know? She sort of tends to babble and not make sense..." He nods to Lotte, "Alright. After the berries, we can do that. I'm tired of ambushes, myself."
Steven blinks, looking blank. "Er.. no, I grew up in an orphanage, a place where children who don't have parents anymore are raised.. and it was run by nuns..."
Lauren dabs her mouth and grins. "They're chasing you, Steven. They want to know where you ran off to."
Lotte frowns. "I never thought about the chance that we would be missed..." She looks a little sad.
Steven rubs his head quizziacly. "I can't imagine why they would do that.. I mean, yeah, I ran away from the orphanage when I was a lot younger but by now they'd surely not still be looking for me, I mean, it's been years!"
Lotte simply says, "How odd. I wonder what she means, then."
Lauren sobers. "Um. hey. That's, uh, a good thought. People missing us."
Kip looks dubious. "Hmh. Well, at least the berries are where I left them, even if the nuns put my eyesight in doubt, because I swear I haven't noticed anyone following us from Summer." He points ahead toward a gigantic mass of bushes in a wide sunny spot; it looks like a clearing, or the start of a meadow.
At the mention of people missing them, Kip goes completely silent and lets his hair fall forward over his shoulders, making it hard to see his face from the side.
Steven glances at Kip's reaction, then triies to change the subject. "Soo... what kind of berries are these?"
Lotte finishes her jerky, still thinking about her parents. She doesn't notice Kip's posture until she looks past him to the berry bushes. "Hey," she says, "you alright?"
Kip's shoulders lift once and fall under the dark and shining hair. "Blackberries, and some cloudberries... yeh. M'fine." He doesn't look up, face still hidden, but his voice is definitely subdued.
Lauren trudges toward the berry-hedge in silence and picks a few--with luck they're ripe. They're the darkest-colored ones anyway.
In Lauren's mouth, the blackberries create a world of ripe, tangy sweetness. Death and sickness are not immediately forthcoming.
Lotte perks up, as she loves both blackberries and cloudberries. "Come on, berry-picking will cheer anyone up." She takes Kip's hand and leads him over to the bushes.
Kip flinches a little as if startled at his hand being captured, but follows Lotte docilely enough to the bushes and shows no reluctance to stuff berries in his face. He gives her a bright enough smile that the moment of sadness she caught right before it might have been a trick of the light.
Lauren chews thoughtfully on a mouthful of juicy summer. "Wt's a clou..." Her question dies in a murderous look toward Lotte.
Lotte picks a few ripe cloudberries and nibbles on them, trying to be happy but her mind racing about Steven's nuns.
The cloudberries are perfect, faintly tasting of honey and sunlight.
Lotte chalks Lauren's look up to just another part of her weird behavior and ignores it, relishing the cloudberry taste in her mouth.
Kip seems quite oblivious to Lauren's glaring, as he stains his fingers and lips deep red with crushed blackberries.
Steven tries hard not to get in between Lotte and Lauren, some sense of self-preservation keeping him safe. He's rather intrigued by the taste of the cloudberries, it'slike nothign hes ever had before. Still, a part of his mind is wondering what Badger... meant by the nuns chasing him.
Quite seriously, Kip swallows and says "Steven, where do you think we should start looking for your nuns? Do you want to set traps, or what?"
Steven stifles a laugh. "Actually... I think we should talk with Badger... first about that, since I don't ahve any idea how they could be out here, let alone looking for me." Besides, he thinks to himself, what do you use as bait for a nun?
Lauren denudes her patch of the cloudberries with a vicious, Prussian efficiency. She doesn't eat them, just pulps them on the stem with a flick of her index finger. Pulp and seeds splatter on nearby leaves as she settles into a brooding funk.
Crenshaw, munching berries nearby, sidles over to Lauren and says sotto voce, "What in the hell is wrong with you? Those are good berries."
Lotte offers some berries to Ghost and some to Swift.
Lauren grumps. "The berries can go to hell. I'm on MILK CARTONS by now and people are horrible."
Kip nods to Steven and says, "I'll take you to her when we're done here, then." He looks much more cheerful stained with berry juice.
Swift lips berries delicately off Lotte's palm. Ghost sniffs them and declines, politely.
Crenshaw says bluntly to Lauren, "No one's being horrible right now but you, to berries. Milk, I see none of here. Are you feeling well?"
Kip eyes the Lauren-horse conference and moves closer to Steven to murmur, "Anytime you're ready, in fact."
Steven nods a little to Kip. "Well... all right, then... maybe the sooner the better..."
Lauren sighs melodramatically and drops her arms to her side. "Crenshaw," she says, in a lecturing tone, "I'm MOPING. So sue me if I haven't had time to sit down and feel sorry for myself and WHINE yet." Relenting a bit, she reaches up to rub the mare's nose. "Stupid human thing. See, everybody's trying to be nice and not watch me do it."
Crenshaw enjoys the nose-rubbing while she considers this, then nods. "I'll take that behavior into consideration... it bears thinking about. What do you have to feel sorry for yourself about? It's pleasant here."
Lauren snerts. "It's not Santa Ana. Anyway." Looking a little sheepish, she pastes on a small smile and waves over to Steven and Kip. "Hey guys. Um. Think we got enough beries here."
Kip nods, and collects the group loosely for the trek to see Badger Mattress about the nuns.
Kip leads the berry-stained little group of animals and elves to a large tree that happens to have Badger Mattress cooking underneath it. A hook dangles above the cookfire, on a rope that vanishes up into the canopy. Steven, Lotte and the four-leggers start to talk to Badger Mattress...
Lauren checks that the other Grey Worlders are properly enthralled by Badger Mattress--who wouldn't be?--and takes a deep breath for courage. She sidles closer to Kip. Another deep breath. Before he has time to edge away from the heavy breathing, she prods his shoulder and mumbles out, softly and quickly, "Kipcanwetalk?"
Kip shifts a wary eye toward Lauren, but nods and steps quietly away from the little gathering. He keeps walking, back toward the berry bushes, as if assuming that she means 'out of earshot,' though he also keeps as much personal space between them as he can and still be able to talk quietly.
Lauren trails after the elf. She'd kinda hoped to have a chance to change into that nice green dress, and maybe make some of that 'fun tea' she promised him a while back, and maybe it would be around sunset or so and she's have a nice corner to back him into, but eh. Seize the carp. "Thanks, Kip. This has SO needed to happen."
Kip's brown eyes go lighter with what might be outright alarm. "It did? Uh. What's wrong?"
Lauren squints, mildly confused. "Wrong? I've been a JERK. You didn't notice?"
Kipiranyllie fidgets and starts to twist his long brown hair around one finger. "Not particularly. You've always been more or less the same."
Lauren tucks her hands firmly into her pockets. "I know. I'm trying to apologize, all right? God, if I don't watch myself this is going to turn into something straight out of a sitcom..." Pause for thought... "and no, you don't really need to know what a sitcom is. I'm sorry for knocking you down and embarassing you and...eh, whatever else it is I did."
Blinking, Kip stops walking-- well out of earshot and even sight of the others, by now-- and tilts his head at Lauren. "You knocked me down a LOT, you realize."
Lauren fiddles with an earlobe, coloring slightly. "I know. I lost count. You want me to apologize some more? 'Cause I'm here. I mean, we've got time, right?"
Kip's skin flushes a little. A bit defensive, he says "I wasn't counting either, I don't know... uh. You really would? If I wanted?" He sounds faintly surprised.
Lauren shrugs equably. "Yah. That's pretty much why we're here, I figure." She scuffs a clump of grass. "But don't overdo it, okay? I COULD die of old age or something."
Kip's eyes flash curious for a moment before it's buried under a more placid look. They're deeper brown now, as he settles. Leaning casually back against a tree as he stands, the slender elf gives Lauren a thoughtful sort of study. "Alright. So why are you sorry?"
Lauren looks over Kip's shoulder, then at the berry hedge in the distance. Not at him AT ALL oh heavens no. "S'just good to be sorry when you've been a jerk to somebody. So they don't have to run away or look nervous when you're around. I hate that."
Kip says with great indignation, "I do NOT run away! And I am NOT nervous." He stays leaning against his tree, pointy chin raised a fraction higher... with a considerable amount of personal space between him and Lauren. A beat later, he mutters, "But thank you that really is nice of you thoughtful and stuff," at a faster speed.
Lauren relaxes considerably at Kip's flash of indignation, coming out of a defensive slouch and grinning just a bit. "You hid under an ottoman," she teases. "Zhi could back me up on it. You so did."
Kip says firmly, "Did NOT," as his shoulders and posture straighten out of their slight hunch. "Zhi isn't a witness, he'd agree with you just to needle me. Maybe you hit your head jumping on me."
Oh, god. SUCH a straight line Kip has just offered to Lauren--dare she take it? Or will Kip try to crawl under the berry hedge? Agh, the indecision! "But I didn't jump on you," she compromises, leaving out the begged-for 'yet'. "We were talking about harnesses and you crawled RIGHT under there when Zhi said I should get one because you weren't done growing yet. I remember it perfectly!"
Kip's jaw opens enough to show slightly-sharper-than-human perfect white teeth, as his eyes go rounder. He turns positively pink, ducking his head to half-hide behind the straight fall of his hair. A mutter, somewhat stifled, comes from the face shrouded in hair. "Oh. ...That." The delicate pointed ears poking out from his hair are all pink, too.
Lauren leans forward to peer up under the curtain of hair. "Um Kip. S'okay. I didn't actually get one or snything. And Zhi's a big sl...uh...well, you know Zhi."
Kip squeaks when Lauren gets closer, and flattens a little against his tree. Sounding almost out of breath, suddenly, he says "Uh huh." His wide eyes track Lauren's every movement. He flattens a little more.
Lauren scuttles back, hands up. "See, that's what I MEAN," she wails. "Stop DOING that! I'm not going to knock you down!"
"Not worried about THAT," Kip wails back, pressed against his tree with the whites of his eyes showing all around the iris. "Stop YELLING!"
Lauren checks the surrounding area, full-circle. Why no yelling? Are there wolves or giant bees or something? Is Rathskeliad around? She doesn't SEE anything... "Okay, okay," she murmurs. "See? no yelling? Better? Christ, calm DOWN."
"Godsblood," murmurs a slowly calming Kip, "You'll get the NUNS after us." Before he glares. "I am calm. Stop.. stop coming so CLOSE."
"Kip, nuns are old ladies who take vows of chastity and poverty and...eh, yeah. If they were here, they wouldn't hunt us. They might bake us some lemon bars or something." Oh-so carefully Lauren sidles back within close conversational range. "It's okay. Nuns no hurt."
Kip gives Lauren the are-you-completely-crazy? look. "Bake. Lemon bars. Steven is being hunted by ELDERLY BAKERS?" The sheer absurdity appears to act as a cushion for Lauren easing unnoticed back into Kip's extra-large personal space.
Lauren nods. "Steven is being hunted by very nice invisible old women who hold bake sales for schools and you are giving way too much credit to some crazy lady named Badger Mattress."
Apparently missing the end part, Kip straightens up from his tree-meld to eye Lauren from not a very superior height at all. "Invisible... nice... You," he says with authority, "are about ten nuts short of a handful." The tone shades just a bit toward taunting. ...Maybe more than just a bit.
Lauren points an authoritative finger at the ground about a foot and a half in front of her. "Get over here and say that like you mean it, you DORK."
Kip's eyes narrow and he swaggers the very short distance required-- barely a step-- to do just that. Standing still, he says sweetly, "Shall I repeat myself word for word or elaborate, you pushy little elf-jumper?"
To give Kip credit, he doesn't seem to realize at all that he said anything with less than G-rated implications.
Lauren grins like a shark. "You could repeat just that last bit, if you wanted."
"What, the part where I insult your sanity or the part where you fling yourself at me like a sack of malicious potatoes?" Kip, for the moment, is entirely too snarky to notice imminent danger.
"Malicious? MALICIOUS? Kip!" Lauren outright thumps him properly, on the sternum. "I came out here to apologize and now I'm a...malicious potato? a MALICIOUS POTATO?" The volume of that last makes birds flap up from nearby trees.
Kip huffs, air knocked out of him, and rebounds right at Lauren. Personal space is put on hold in favor of tackling the malicious potato good and proper. They land with a thud and roll. Kip is briefly on the bottom before he's scrambling away backwards to get away again, crablike-- severely hampered by trees behind him. He bonks his head and stops scrambling, flat on his back again with a yelp... not far from the Lauren that seconds ago was getting reacquainted with the fact that Kip makes a surprisingly springy and comfortable mattress, aside from one or two poky bits that might or might not be hips.
Lauren has had it, by gum! She's back on her feet in a flash and makes a dive for Kip. Maybe it was a good thing she didn't get a chance to put on those gauzy skirts after all. Malicious Potato INDEED! Ten nuts short! The excuse of violence and bodily harm as a chance to actually touch Kip is a mere twinkle in the back of her mind.
Kip emits a stifled yelp as he is landed upon from a moderate height, losing the air in his lungs yet again. An attempt to flail translates mostly to vigorous squirming-- which stops abruptly as her new mattress refocuses and stares up at Lauren, nowhere even close to the Kippish minimum safe distance.
Lauren clasps a hand on each of Kip's shoulders, braces her knees around his ribs, and glares crispy death down on him. "I was being NICE," she snaps. "Do I have to knock your head against a rock or something? You owe ME an apology."
Kip is rock-hard tense everywhere Lauren's touching. Those shoulders are going to hurt later. In a pitiful voice, barely above a whisper, he says "You're sitting on top of me again." The elf is pink. "Could you not do that? I'll, I'll do whatever, just please."
"Oh, all right then." Lauren settles her forearms across Kip's chest. It's a meditative posture, and she takes just a moment to appreciate this very rare and lovely situation. It's a bit...ooh...a bit domme-ish, isn't it? She feels more than a little tingly. Carefully, with every effort made not to look like a gourami, she pooches her lips out JUST so.
Kip's big brown eyes are both full of terror-- and not entirely immune to the tingly effect. He swallows, hard, still blushing up a salmon-pink storm. "Y-you don't mean.. please Lauren, I can't, I... but..." This is as meek and pleading as Lauren's ever seen him-- the only actual resistance happening is verbal. Kip's eyes are intent on her lips, and it's clear she doesn't look at all like a fish to him.
Lauren unpuckers long enough to sigh, resignedly, and to roll her dark eyes once. Then she apologizes on Kip's behalf by lowering her head and very, very thoroughly showing him a few fun things she learned from Zhi for the past few weeks.
...just a FEW. After all, they both have their clothes on.
For a long and perfect moment, hanging suspended in time, it's a very reciprocal kiss-- enough to suggest that Kip likes her quite a bit and is either a natural, or perhaps Zhi's taught him a few of the same things. The next moment, there is a loud POP, the oddest sensation of air rushing to fill a vacuum-- and the only thing hanging suspended is Lauren, several inches above the ground, before time resumes and her knees hit packed leaves. Kip... isn't there anymore.
Lauren thumps down with a terrified squeak, skinning the hell out of her chin. After a few seconds on the ground, well-spent pondering the vagaries of fate, she's up on her feet and stomping tree-ward to DAMN WELL KILL SOMEBODY.
...Kip, however, is probably safe... being nowhere in sight.
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