Finally home. [cierra&opem]

[Xane;;]

-♦-"Have I reached where I began?"-♦-
Cierra.

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Her paws barely left the ground, she was exhausted. She had been running for miles and days. She had lost count. Her previous place of living was a strange group called the "darkmoon faire" a group of wolves who traveled to entertain packs and territories. They were a strange group of wolves, but at least they were all together. They were a family. Unfortunatly, the group had been separated. A group of humans were chasing them. Every scattered, she had no clue where everyone went. All she knew, is that she was alone again.

Her tail drug in the ground, her ears were alert but laid against her skull. Whenever she took a step her paw print was encased in ice for a few brief seconds. Whenever she felt down or exhausted, her ice control did whatever it wanted as long as her body provided the action. Walking was a very common power activation. She knew the humans wouldn't be able to find her, even with the ice tracks. She had lost them days ago, but she refused to slow down until she left like her body was about to give.

She found her walking came to and end when she arrived at a water fall. She raised her muzzle to the air, the place seemed familiar. In fact, the past few places she had been looked familiar. Could it be she had reached home? Did she manage to find where she began before the faire? She wanted to smile, she wanted to rejoice in the moment. But all she wanted now was sleep. 

Her legs were shaking. Shortly after stopping, they collapsed under her. She fell to the ground without a care to the world. She didn't care what would happen right now. She had enough energy to defend herself. She always saved energy. But now she wanted sleep. She needed sleep. She needed to refuel on energy. And within these thoughts she found herself already falling asleep. And then she drifted off.  

[Shanto]

• Ricochet

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He was growing into middle age, and was living then on the walk from a past life. He installed himself on a wide rock and ate a rabbit down in the evenings as his pack mate, Tag, licked his own stunning white fur clean and reported happily on his chipmunk companion. His friends knew his likes, the sting of his sarcasm in words. They didn't know how their companion made his own life so hard, or why they so often were on the move. They didn't even know their friend's true name. He was known in the packs as Ricochet. And he went everywhere unrecognized from the past and lunched with southerners, easterners, and westerners alike; calling himself a peacekeeper or a permanent-by-choice loner. Someone rich and leisured, who had the common touch.

He had two incompletely healed bullet holes in his lower chest and another in his thigh. He was missing the nub of his left middle toe and was cautious, lest that mutilation be seen. He also had a condition that was referred to as "granulated eyelids" and it caused him to blink more than usual; As if he found creation slightly more than he could accept. Rooms seemed hotter when he was in them. Rains fell straighter. Time seemed slowed. Sounds were amplified. He considered himself a Southern loyalist and guerrilla in a Civil War that never ended. He regretted neither his robberies, nor the seventeen murders that he laid claim to. He had seen another summer in the great valleys of the packs and on August 5th, he was thirty-four-years-old.

Two days before he had left his white furred friend behind. Splitting once, every now and then, had been what really kept them closer than before. Coming together, they would tell of their recent expeditions. Entertaining and dining. Relaxing and chatting. Tag was one of the elite group of 5 wolves Ricochet had bothered to get to know more personally. Most he had met before were just not worth the breath it took to say hello. Now his paws drifted quietly over the grass. The steps were completely silent under sound of the water. This was not loner territory; that he knew, but chose to ignore. Southern was a closer friend of his. Or at least last he knew of them. Rumor had been spreading of a battle to come. But that again, was just a silly old rumor.

The breath admitting from his mouth was hot in the late summer cool. It melted the icy tracks he found in an instant. Almost as if the ice was nervous just to be around his hot-blooded presence. Something about him could change things quicker than the normal. Closing his eyes, a scent was taken in. It was cool and mysterious. It was one of those smells a being just loves. Something that others might find ridiculous, but the one that loved it could just not get enough of. Ricochet took it in, letting it wrap around his soul and into his mind. Processing it. Lack of words, for once, slowed him down. A description seemed to be missing, or in fact unnecessary for the time being. A sigh was let out of the large male's body. He didn't want to move from the scent, avoid it as he usually did. Instead it grew in him and by any other wolf it could be described as perfection.

Instead it reminded him of what he once had, the past he had once forgotten. What he had tried so hard to forget. What he could never forget. Several facts were terrifying about Ricochet. Never had he revealed his discoveries about himself to anyone other than one female. A female that could never accept who he was at the time. One who had left him by what seemed like force. But he pushed it aside, and what he had not gotten past before, was now overtaken. He walked forward, allowing the smell to grow strong in his nose. Ignoring all previous warnings from his brain. The fact that he could now see the female, was a tad overwhelming, and as he stopped dead in his tracks he questioned what had really drawn him to the quietly sleeping female in the grass beside the water.

An idea is like a virus, resilient, highly contagious.
The smallest seed of an idea can grow.
It can grow to define or destroy you.

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[Xane;;]

-♦-"Can't I get some decent relaxation before dealing with this again?!"-♦-
Cierra.

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She was faced with a small pack fight. More or less a few wolves who called themselves a pack. They were protecting their territory. Although they all knew they were just passing through. She admired their thinking skills, even if they hadn't fully plotted it out. "Walk away loner..." the so called "alpha" warned. She grinned at them, "aren't we all loners on the inside?" she easily saw past their little lies. The group of loners growled, she spotted their defensiveness. "Watch your mouth, you unloyal whelp!" his insults blew right past her. A whelp? Where was this wolf coming from? Her ears laid back and she lowered her body closer to the ground. "Oh, what are you going to do to me?" her voice was sarcastic. He didn't find this amusing. The females to the left and right of him lowered themselves for a launching attack. "So you're going to attack a single wolf? How prideful is that!" obviously she was only say this to distract them. Distract them from what, exactly?

As the alleged alpha and her maintained the harsh banter, she practiced her power. Her most effective power could always use more practice. As she spoke, ice slowly formed over the grass. It spread from her paws and towards the wolves who were ready to attack her. "It's only prideful since we are protecting our territory. That is unless you want to get out scratch free and never to return..." his growl was low. He was getting agitated. 'Just a little longer...' she hopefully thought to herself. The ice was now spread under their bodies and around their paws; which was the only thing left to cover. "Want me to leave?" now was time for the rapid freeze ability she had recently learned. "Then make me!" and those were the magic words. "Get her!" he order to his small females. But before they had any chance to get their paws off the ground the ice grew up their legs and forcibly stuck them to the ground. "What the!" he stared at the ground at the trap he had gotten his pack in. Each of them were stuck, each leg encased in ice. "Not going to?" she stood up from her crouched position, "then I will be on my way!" She laughed to herself as they struggled to free themselves and as she waltzed through their "territory".

Her mind was eventful, but her body spoke differently. Her paws and legs twitched on the grass. Of course, this could be associated with anything. Being attacked, chasing prey, running from nothing. A breeze ruffled her fur. Then a scent caught her nose. Her ear twitched, her mind was waking up. Suddenly, her eyes opened in a mere millisecond. She may have been asleep, but her other scenes were what kept her from being comfortably asleep. 

Upon opening her eyes she felt a presence. A wolf was standing over her. She scrambled to her paws for a quick defense. "Who are you and what do you want?" her haunches raised and her body was low for a attack. She felt an odd sensation in her legs. A perplexed look cam upon her face. They felt weak, she could feel herself falling back to the ground. She must have been more exhausted than she thought. She took a few more steps away from the male. "Curses..." she muttered as her legs collapsed under her. This is not how she wanted to be caught. Exhausted and useless. She might as well think her final thoughts now of this wolves intentions are to kill her off.