Hazel, how do you want to have Davina and Kimi meet? Do want them to just randomly find each other in the woods, or should they meet at a cafe or whatever, or something else?

Aaaaa! I'm actually rping here!! Omk, I haven't roleplayed as Davina in quite some time.

Davina Starr~

I sit beneath a cherry tree, much like the one at the Ball of Stars. Too much, in fact. It's bringing back bad memories. I should really get up and move, but I don't.

The sun is slowly beginning to rise, and it occurs to me I haven't slept at all for two days. No wonder why I can barely move and I can't think straight. I would have been sleeping, but the dreams...

I don't think I can stand to have another nightmare about tje...murder. Balls are supposed to be safe. That one clearly wasn't.

I lay my head down. Sleep is so tempting.... But is it worth the nightmares? 

Apparently, it is, because next thing I know, I blinking awake as the sun glares at me. Huh, I didn't have any nightmares.

Then I see the footprints. It looks like the odd mixture of a human foot and a racoon paw. I think briefly about the racoon anthro I saw at the Ball. What was her name again? Oh right, Kimi. But it couldn't have been her...

Or could it?

~~~

Is this alright for Kimi and Davina to meet?? 

For now, here's a post I wrote in the car for my new character.

Selena Evadere~Dagger Bay, Southeastern Kyngdom:

The masts creaked as wind pressed against the bound sails, carrying my ship, the Thunderbird,  slowly through the water. I closed my eyes and let the breeze carry quietly over my face, taking a deep breath before opening them and making my way to the prow of the ship.

The waters near Dagger Bay were choppy and dull, lapping hungrily at tall stones that rose from the water like jagged fangs. Fog surrounded my crew and I, curling around the boat and clinging to our clothes and skin. This mist was not so thick that we could not see; however--we were heading towards a large, sheltered cove ringed with rocks, mossy ground, and misshapen gray trees that spread their wide leaves over us like the roof of a cave.

We were in the outskirts of Dagger Bay, close to the city of Paralia. I wouldn’t have set our course to such a remote location on a normal day, but circumstances were calling for a subtle arrival in Paralia, so this quiet cove would have to hide the ship for now.

I clambered up the ropes and scanned the shoreline. “Prepare to weigh anchor!” I shouted, swinging round to survey what was behind us.

“Aye aye, Captain!”

We weighed anchor in the center of the cove. “Okay!” I called, approaching my second mate, Darya. “Ready to go?”

Darya rested a hand on her cutlass. “Yes.”

“Alright!” I called to the rest of the crew. “Darya and I will be going to negotiate with the northern pirates now. You know the drill! Expect us back before sunrise tomorrow. If we aren't back by then, well, you know that drill too.”

Darya and I hopped into the small rowboat and paddled to shore. I led the way into the forest, and we began the trek to Paralia. 

Davina~

I sit perfectly still. It seems as if everything is silent. The only other thing I hear is the breath of something.

I make the first move, and look on the other side of the tree.

"Oh. It's you." I say.

Kimi jumps , and then turns around. 

"Oh! Uh, hello, I was ju--" She begins.

"I don't care, " I interrupt, "What are you even doing out here?"

" Well, what are you doing out here? " She challenges. I sigh, and pull something out of my pocket. It's a wrinkled advertisement.

"This is why I'm traveling," I say, showing her the poster .

"A flea market? And they're selling the Power of Hoof?"  Kimi asks, wonder in her eyes.

" Apprently, " I reply.

"Whoa."

I have to admit , I was pretty surprised when I first saw the poster. Someone selling the Power of Hoof? Well, that was pretty awesome.

"Are you going to buy it?" Kimi asks.

" Hah! No way, it's definitely going to be way too expensive. and besides, why would I even want something like ghat? No, I just want to see who's selling the thing, " I reply. And maybe steal it,  I think. But I don't say that.

~~~

Your turn!! 

The girl pulled her scarf further up on her face, frowning as the wool touched her skin. It was too hot for the huge scarf, but the only attention she would get would be people staring at her scarf and silently thinking she was insane--or maybe from the desert, where people wore cloths over their mouths to protect themselves from the sand.

They would probably just think she was insane. But as long as it kept notice away from her...

She checked the advertisement again. There were those words. She had marked them with a cheap highlighter, and couldn't stop staring at them. "Selling" "Power of Hoof". 

Was this the fake Power again? Had someone found a different Power? Questions kept swirling through her mind. But there was one that kept rising and coming back.

Is this the answer I need? 

Selena Evadere~Paralia, Southeast Kyngdom:

The walk to Paralia took nearly an hour. We arrived in the city from the coast side, where a bustling cove full of ships, crews, cargo, and general mayhem awaited us.

“Watch your pockets,” Darya muttered, spying the crowd that whirled about the port.

“Mm,” I replied absentmindedly. Then something caught my eye in the water. “Look, there’s his ship!”

“His--” Darya broke off, confused, and followed my finger to the tall, looming ship rocking gently in the cove. Its masts towered over those of any other ship, and its design was magnificent, smooth and glossy unlike any ship you’d find from southeastern Kyngdom. This ship was clearly foreign. And with its graceful stag maidenhead, anyone could tell that it hailed straight from the icy north.

Darya pulled her eyes away from the ship and smacked my arm as we descended into Paralia’s chaotic port, unnoticed. “You didn’t tell me we were going to be negotiating with HANS!” she exclaimed. “I would’ve been a lot more able to relax if you’d just told me straight out!”

“Surprise,” I said with a grin. “Now you know why I’m not worried.”

There was some enmity between northern and southern pirates. Negotiations between the two were, generally speaking, unpleasant experiences. However, there was one pirate crew from the north we had a friendly history with...But that’s a story I’ll save for later.

I had kept the details of the trip private from everyone on the ship, including Darya. Usually I wouldn’t have done this, but this meeting really was extremely serious business, and secrecy was of utmost importance. A lot of money was at stake.

“Where are we meeting?”

“The Hjorthane,” I replied. Hans’s ship.

We wove our way through the crowd, which was more concentrated near where the Hjorthane was anchored. All the Paralians wanted to get a good, long look at this exotic boat.

The gangplank was down, but no pirates were on it. The closer we got to the ramp, the thinner the crowd became, until it abruptly cut off about thirty feet away from the plank. The citizens knew better than to get any closer than that.

Darya and I climbed up the gangplank and boarded the ship. Haha, I thought as we ascended, wary of the stares behind our backs. There goes our subtle arrival.

“Captain Phantasma!” crowed a voice as soon as I set foot onto the ship. I looked to my left, and there was Hans Forsberg, captain of the Hjorthane, coming down from the quarter deck. He was dressed formally, and had cleaned off his hat for the meeting.

“Captain Forsberg!” I called back jubilantly, turning to face him.

When he got closer, he greeted Darya.

“Hans,” she replied with a nod. “It’s good to see you again.”

“Aye. It’s been far too long!”

“How was the trip?” I asked.

“It was eventful,” Hans responded. “A lot of traffic on the waters.”

“I’m not surprised,” I replied. “There’s a big market coming up near Mer.”

“Ahh,” he said, nodding in understanding. “Well, most of them cleared out of our way pretty easily.”

“That’s good. All you had to do was flash your cannons at them,” I grinned.

“Precisely.”

Hans took us on a quick tour of his ship. Part of it had been completely redone. “Great Claaws!” I exclaimed. “What happened??”

“You know Catastrophe?”

“...Yeah, I’ve heard of him.”

“Well, he has part of his military parked up in the north right now. They’ve taken control of a few trading ships, and...we got a little too close.”

“Oh. Well that’s unfortunate.”

Hans nodded.

Soon we retired to his quarters, where we could get down to business without his crew eavesdropping on our top-secret negotiations.

“Alright,” Darya said as soon as we sat down in his lavishly-furnished study. “Selena didn’t tell me what we were coming for until this morning. The Power of Hoof?? Seriously?! There’s no way you found it.”

“Hmm,” Hans said, raising his eyebrows dramatically. “Or is there?”

He unlocked the safe behind his desk and pulled out an intricately-designed drum. It looked just like the one I’d read about in books.

Hans set it down on his desk.

“It’s just like you said in the letter,” I remarked, taking in the drum’s every detail. “Wow.”

“Wow is right. It was extremely hard to get.”

A grin crept up the side of my face as I compared it to various descriptions of Unicorn’s drum. “And it almost looks exactly like the real thing.” Not that I knew what the real thing actually looks like. I only knew that, from what Hans had told me, this was a very deceptive fake.

“Have you tried using it?” I asked curiously.

“Hah. No,” Hans replied. “It’s kind of hard to find a horse when you’re a pirate.”

“Too true.”

“So--what have you brought for me this time, Selena?” Hans asked, scooting the drum aside to make room for my things.

“Aw, you mean I can’t have it for free?” I laughed. “You have to give it to me at this point--I’ve already been advertising it!” I pulled off my satchel and set it on the table, revealing the plundered items within.

Oh, negotiations with Hans were always enjoyable. He brought me stuff from the north; I brought him stuff from the south...we traded as friends. So at ease together were we that half of the time we just laughed and joked around.

“Hm...Throw in that necklace of yours, and you’ve got yourself a deal!”

Hans always offered for my necklace. I was never sure why. But it had become a tradition every time we saw each other.

“Oh, you don’t want this...it’s cursed, remember?!”

He always took that line as a joke. After all--why would I wear a cursed object around my neck? He had no idea how true that statement really was…

Once I’d finished my negotiations for the completely and 100% real Power of Hoof drum, we traded, and that was that. Then the three of us spent the rest of the day catching up while roaming the streets of Paralia.

When the sun began to set, we headed back to the Hjorthane and I collected the drum. We then stood by the gangplank as we prepared to go our own separate ways.

“Well, we’d better get back to our own crew now,” I remarked, Darya by my side. “We have places to be.”

“Aye,” Hans agreed. “Good luck at the market.”

“And good luck finishing your more serious negotiations,” I returned. “Thanks for the loot.”

“‘Til we meet again, Phantasma.”

We parted.

Since everyone else is RPing their characters in preparation for the flea market, I will too.I haven’t RPed as Sprocket in a really long time, and it feels really weird  

“Can you hand me that socket wrench, please?” I ask Kristjan. I am currently holding down the metal plating for one of my automatons, and I needed to tighten the bolt connecting the two sheets to secure it. 

“Yup,” he says, then places the wrench on the table next to me.

“Thanks,” I say.

We’re in one of my workshops in the Resistance base(quick out of story question: where the heck is the Reaistance base right now?!?) repairing the salvageable automatons that were left over from the last battle. We’re the only humans in the room, the only other beings being the other automatons that are helping with repair.

We work in silence, the sounds of machinery and schreeching metal discouraging any conversation.

I’m just finishing tightening down the bolt when Kristjan speaks.

“Hey, have you seen this?”

“Hang on,” I grunt,  straining to tighten the bolt as far as it will go. Satisfied with how tight it is, I turn to Kristjan. “What?”

He’s holding a flyer that must have been dropped or left on one of the toolbenches. The colors are bright and garish, but I can make out the words Kyndom Flea Market. 

“It says that they’re selling the Power of Hoof,” Kristjan remarks.

I look at him quizzically.

“How on earth would they be able to sell a power at a flea market? I don’t know a lot about powers, but I’m pretty sure you can’t just sell them like that.”

He shrugs.

“All the same, it wouldn’t hurt to check it out. Plus, you never know what could be there. We could find some interesting things.”

I feel like he’a trying to cover up the real reason he wants to go, but I nod anyways. 

“We can go I guess. But we have to finish up repairing these before we go, because we can’t just leave them here.”

I smile as he groans and slumps his shoulders.

“Come on, it’s not that bad,” I say, moving back to the automaton I was working on.

“Not for you. All of these tiny screws are killing me.”

He moves back to his work despite his complaints and we soon lapse back into silence.  

Kimi~

"Oh. It's you," Davina says before I can even move.

"Oh!" I jump and turn around, somewhat startled. Davina stares back at me, her eyebrows up. She's probably thinking I was trying to steal something off her. "Uh, hello. I was ju--"

"I don't care," she stops me. "What are you even doing out here?"

Looking for food to potentially steal? ...I decide it doesn't matter what I'm doing out here. "Well, what are you doing out here?" I counter.

Davina sighs and pulls a wrinkled piece of paper out of her pocket--a small poster, rendered in bright, colorful inks. She shows it to me and I read some of the larger text. Power of Hoof. To be sold. At the annual Mer flea market.

My eyes widen. The Power of Hoof! I know about the Power of Hoof from the stories our elders used to tell. And also from Catastrophe's prison. They--that is, Catastrophe's soldiers--had been searching for it. "The drum" was always being talked about in hushed conversations between shift changes.

"A flea market...And they're selling the Power of Hoof?!" I exclaim. I wonder what Davina thinks about all this. I wonder how many other people have heard about it. I wonder who's selling the Power of Hoof, if they have anything to do with Catastrophe, and if they don't--will Catastrophe be there?

"Apparently."

"...Whoa." My eyes stray back to the poster. 

I keep an awed expression, but behind my mask, I'm considering the circumstances. Suddenly, I look back up at Davina, a half-grin spreading onto my face. "Are you going to buy it?"

"Hah! No way; it's definitely going to be way too expensive. And besides, why would I even want something like that? No, I just want to see who's selling the thing."

"Mmm," I respond, nodding. I'm curious myself as to who might be selling the Power of Hoof. And also as to who might want to buy it. "So you're heading to Mer, huh. That's in the south, right? I...wonder how the Power of Hoof got all the way down there."

Aliaza~~~

I look up to see Akili dangling Kimi's sword, Machali rushes forwards and knocks it out of her hands. She growls and disapears. I shake my head, when will this be over? Why haven't they killed them yet? Kimi smiles and picks up her sword and talks to it. To my surprise it talks back, I shrugg and continue walking on, slightly bored. 

"I'm going look ahead, I'll meet you at nightfall." I say.

"Are you sure?" Kimi asks.

"Of course, I need a break." I say.

I grin, smile, wave, and turn into my eagle. People back away as I flap my wings and shoot into the air, watching everyone shrink below me.  

A girl bit her lip. She had been shadowing travellers for too long now. They gossipped about the Power of Hoof. They talked about the Flea Market. They were wistful, excited, bored, and just plain confused.

She glanced upwards, peering through the branches and leaves far above her. Something passed above--but it was just an eagle. Nothing else.

She adjusted her pack and continued, her feet beating to the rythym of four syllables. Power of Hoof. Power of Hoof. Power of Hoof.