there's no rest [quick]

[Valeria Kazakov]

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[atrb=background,http://i.imgur.com/IXe9tNG.png] Eyes were unreliable things. They saw only what they wanted to see and when they didn’t want to see the blindness was unbearable. Humans had learnt to cope with this disability. There was braille which one could learn in order to read. There were dogs that led the blind along streets and across roads and kept them safe. It would have been amazing to be able to have that kind of luxury; to be able to get by in the world when your sight was gone. But this was the Menagerie. In that big dome no one was safe and no one could take any short cuts. The anthropomorph often found herself pondering the idea of sight and the way that it was never helpful when you needed it to be. Valeria was unsure what has happening. Her eyes that morning had been perfectly fine and she had been able to see clearly. She had left to go for her duty, but had found herself walking further and further away from Nakoma lands. Her shoes were back in her territory, hiding away. She had on only a stained white t-shirt and a pair of ripped denim shorts. Her eyes continued to co-operate until she had found herself closer to Fallen territory. It was then that everything seemed to fall apart. The vibrations had shocked her soles and she had turned around to find a man running towards her. He stopped just in front of her and Val felt her eyesight dissolving as she blinked. All of a sudden the man was blurred, his edges undefined and she was unable to make out any of the finer details. She could barely tell what clothes he was wearing or the length of his hair. Her feline ears twitched as she watched him carefully, not daring to speak for fear of the man before her. Why had he not attacked yet? Was he not dangerous? Surely he was. She was an anthro; everyone was dangerous to her except her own kind. She should have run. She knew she should have run. But Valeria could not work out which way was home. “What are you doing here freak?” The man’s voice was filled with venom and Valeria instinctively took a step backwards. At that, the shifter growled and moved towards her. Then she was off. Val’s feet turned her around and carried her forwards, taking her away from the shifter in pursuit. Heart pounding in her chest, Val closed her eyes and moved with instinct. Her ears picked up on even the slightest of sounds and she could hear the shifter’s breathing and feel his footsteps behind her. Each moment made her force herself forwards even faster. If it was not for the gifts the keepers had given her she would surely have been caught and killed by the shifter. Carna. That was the word that came to mind when she thought of the creature behind her. It was a Carna who had attacked her when she had first arrived in the Menagerie. He too had called her a freak and threatened to kill her. In that moment she had been more scared than she had been in the entire year she had spent with the keepers. At least she knew where the keepers stood. She knew that each and every one would want to hurt her. But in the Menagerie there were some creatures who did not wish to bring her harm. Valeria no longer knew the difference and decided that only those of her own kind could be trusted. The vibrations were gaining on her, despite her ability to pounce over her obstacles with little effort. Perhaps he too had been gifted with agility. Val’s eyes opened just in time to find herself across the Fallen borderline. She should not be there either. If she was not killed by the Carna she would be killed by the Fallen for trespassing. Turning to risk a glance behind herself she accidentally lost her footing and felt her back smack against the ground. Clenching her teeth through the pain, she closed her eyes, not wanting to see even the blurred shapes of the shifter as he pounced. w o r d s , seven oh two t a g , quick taylor m u s e , in the middle of the night by within temptation n o t e s , first ic post with val

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["Quick" Taylor]

Quick was out on a patrol of the border, like he liked to do on occasion, despite his position as Beta. He wasn't the type of leader to lead from behind, or even in front of, those whom he led. No, he preferred to lead from among them. What better way to do that then by doing what they do on occasion? To tell the truth, though, he just missed the simplicity of being a Scout or a Hunter. He did it to get away from the endless needs of his job as Beta, even if only for a short time. Next week he was going to go out with a hunting party to catch food for the Ring. He always enjoyed those outings particularly. He always enjoyed the thrill of the hunt, especially a challenging one.

Quick paused in his thoughts and his patrol as a pair of scents caught his attention. They were familiar, but he could only make one out for sure: Carna. There was a Carna either crossing their borders or right on the edge, and Quick intended to make sure there were no territorial incursions. Following the scent, he put his Keeper-given speed into heading towards the source.

It didn't take long for Quick to get the Carna-bastard in sight. He was right ahead, chasing after something, or someone. That was obviously the other scent that he was smelling, which was getting stronger and stronger now. Finally he was able to identify it as an Anthro, probably from the Nakoma. Even if the Anthro wasn't a Nakoma member, though, their Tribe would still frown upon the Fallen allowing a Carna to butcher one within their borders. With a possible war brewing on the horizon with the Carna, the Fallen couldn't afford to make enemies out of the Anthros. He pushed himself to run as fast as he possibly could to catch the Carna Shifter before he killed the Anthro.

Both the Carna and the anthro were in clear sight now, Quick noticing the Anthro to be a girl with large, cat-like ears on top of her head. She ended up going down as she turned back to try and catch a glimpse of her pursuer. Quick gritted his teeth as he saw the Carna jump on top of her, pinning her to the ground. He was so intent on his quarry that he didn't notice the Fallen Beta right on his heels.

Quick closed in before he had a chance to actually harm her, thankfully. Without slowing, he ran full force at the Carna and, using his experimentally augmented strength, he sent a punch flying at the guy's side. The force of the blow sent the guy flying a couple yards away, where he crumpled into a writhing heap of obvious pain. That hit had probably broken a few ribs. Quick walked over and grabbed the squirming Carna by the collar of his shirt and hauled him up to eye level.

"You're lucky I don't kill you on the spot, you bastard," he told the Carna,"Now get out of here before I decide this mercy was a mistake."

He let the man drop to the sandy ground. As he landed, the Carna man started crawling away, the pain in his ribs too great to allow him to stand. Served him right for forgetting about territorial borders.

At this point Quick turned his attention to the Anthro girl. She appeared to be frightened and very out of breath. He decided he could take her back to the Fallen Station and maybe give her some food before sending her on her way. He walked over next to where she was on the ground and extended his hand in an offer to help her up.

"You won't have to worry about him anymore," Quick said with a small smile to help ease her fear,"You're safe now."

[Valeria Kazakov]

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[atrb=background,http://i.imgur.com/IXe9tNG.png] The weight of the Carna pushed her whole body into the ground and Valeria held her breath. She waited for the final blow to come, ready for the pain to set in and then for the dullness to numb its sting. The wait was too long. The weight was suddenly gone and Val heard other noises around her. She had been too caught up in the fear to even feel the feet rushing towards her body. She had not heard the approaching shifter, but she heard him speak in anger to the Carna that had attacked her. A smile crossed her face briefly, before she noticed that perhaps this other shifter wanted her all to himself. Perhaps he wanted to be the one to end her disgusting, unnatural, life. The fear dawning on her, Val began to sit up, just as she felt the man walking towards her. Stopping, Valeria’s feline ears pricked upwards, swivelling to catch the sounds of the footsteps across the dusty ground. The vibrations stopped before her and Valeria looked up, her eyes opening slowly. She hoped with all her might that he would not be put off by the sight of her hideousness. Her ocelot eyes watched him carefully, the world slowly deciding to come back into focus. She noticed that he had his hand outreached and decided it would be rude not to accept it. She was in his territory, after all, and after the events with the Carna Val decided it was safest just to do whatever this other man said. Valeria reached her right hand up, but paused slightly when she realised what that would mean. It would mean that he would have to touch her fur covered hand. Many other shifters thought that the mutations were contagious and Val wondered whether this shifter shared those views. If he did, he would stop her, she decided and placed her hand in his. Pulling herself up to her feet, Valeria let a small smile creep back onto her lips. “Thanks,” she murmured, smiling up at him, the word tainted by her thick Russian accent. She owed him her life, and probably a lot more than just that. That did not completely destroy her fear, however. There was still a slight chance that the man before her was also against her. There was always a chance with that though, and Valeria needed to learn to take chances. It was those chances that had led her to meet so many great people in the Menagerie, but it was also those chances that led to near death. The M was a dangerous place and if you didn’t have your wits about you then you were as good as dead. Everyone looked out for themselves, unless of course you were in a ring or tribe. Even then though, in the end it would be every man for himself. Survival of the fittest. As a result of the experiments they had been reduced to the simplest, most primitive, form of living. Darwin’s theory was all they had left. “Surprisingly, that isn’t the first time this has happened,” Valeria blushed slightly, not really knowing why she had said it. Perhaps she simply wanted to make conversation with him. Friends and allies were scarce in a place like that. Besides, she was in Fallen territory and she had heard before that the Fallen were sympathetic to people like her. After all they had sided with the Bestia in the great battle years earlier. Surely they hadn’t changed their minds about the anthros in such a small space of time. Ears twitched slightly and Val let her bare feet take in the vibrations all around them. She could feel the shifter in front of her, as he kept on going in and out of focus. My eyes are really playing up today, Valeria thought, blinking a few times to try to get them going. In the end she just gave up and let the world around her blur and sharpen every now and then. “I’m Valeria,” she mentioned almost as an afterthought, not really concentrating on what she was saying. “Most just call me Val.” w o r d s , six hundred ninety four t a g , quick taylor m u s e , slow and steady by of monsters and men n o t e s , she's not very good at concentrating...

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["Quick" Taylor]

The girl looked up at Quick as he walked over, and hesitated when he reached out to help her up. She eventually took the offer, though, and thanked him. He noticed there was a thick accent to her voice when she spoke, and he briefly wondered where she was from.

He looked at her, sizing her up. She was just slightly shorter than him, with a small, slender build that lent itself to quick movements. Her ears, which were definitely a part of her mutations, were large and cat-like, as were her eyes. Her entire right arm was covered in a coat of fur . She was dressed in rather torn up clothes, like most people in the Menagerie, and wore no shoes. He also noted how she carried herself, which at that particular moment bespoke fear. Then again, who could blame her after being chased by a Carnaring Scout. She was definitely good looking, even as an Anthro, which gave Quick a few ideas as to what that Scout would have done to her had he not been there. She interrupted his thoughts as she mentioned that this hadn't been the first time she'd been attacked by the Carnaring.

"Well, maybe you should be more careful," he said, giving her a small, friendly smile,"but at least you were lucky enough to get chased into our territory. We're friends to the Anthros. In fact, we have quite a few from the old Bestia tribe among us."

"I'm Valeria. Most just call me Val," she said, after doing quite a bit of blinking. Quick frowned slightly at that.

"Well, it's nice to meet you, Val. My name's Quick. I noticed you were blinking your eyes a lot. Are they okay?"

As he finished speaking again, he reached out with his telepathy to see if he could find any other Carna members in the area. He spread the mental scan out for two miles trying to find the Carna Scout he'd just beaten to a pulp. A ways away, he could feel a group, and among them was the one he'd beaten off of Valeria. If he was going to keep her safe, he needed to get her to the Fallen's camp. From there, he could find a way to get her back to the Nakoma's territory.

"We shouldn't stay here," he said, reigning his telepathic scan back in, "That scout's getting some of his buddies to come after us. We should head for the Fallen camp. It'll be safer there."

[Valeria Kazakov]

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[atrb=background,http://i.imgur.com/IXe9tNG.png] Smiling, the anthro let out a small laugh at his comment. “I know. Trust me I’m trying but it’s not helpful when the Carna like to come particularly close to our borders. It’s my job to chase them away but I find most of the time they do all the chasing.” The smile faded only slightly, and her thoughts wandered back to her tribe. She had been on scout duty, patrolling near the borders when the Carna had chased her, running for at least an hour. It was her agility that had helped her out in the end. Without it she would have been caught long before reaching Fallen territory. The Carna, thankfully, had not had as many abilities as she did. Valeria feared to think about what would have happened had he been gifted with speed or agility or even strength. Her conclusion was that she would not be standing there if he had been granted those talents. “Yes I was told about the Bestia a while ago. You see I only came upon this place a little after they’d disappeared and the Nakoma had formed. I think if I hadn’t have been found by a Nakoma the first time I got here, I probably would have ended up in Fallen.” Val’s ears flicked slightly, turning to pick up on the noises around her. She could hear the wind rustling the trees and wondered how many Fallen were nearby. She couldn’t hear or feel any, and that comforted her. Surely they couldn’t all be as nice as this young man. More often than not Valeria was running into shifters who despised her kind. But it was impossible to understand. They hadn’t wanted to become like this, it was never their choice. They had been stolen from their homes and experimented on, caught between animal and human, unsure of what they truly were. Quick. The Russian repeated the name in her head. It was strange and most obviously not his real name, but an alias. Many shifters in the Menagerie went by false names, leaving behind all traces of their previous lives. She supposed it was a coping strategy. If you didn’t remember who you used to be then you couldn’t miss that part of yourself. Valeria could never forget who she was though. Her own father had turned her into the Menagerie. He had loved her and then he had betrayed her. Val would never be able to forget something as horrible as that. He was her only family and he had given her up thinking her a monster. Was she though? Valeria frowned slightly at the next few words the shifter spoke. It seemed she had been too obvious with her blinking. “Oh it’s nothing really. These ocelot eyes aren’t quite as good as my human ones. Sometimes I can see and sometimes I can’t. Right now it’s all a bit blurry. But I’ve got good hearing and I can feel all kinds of vibrations around me. That makes up for my frequent lack of sight.” Valeria was not quite used to explaining her predicament, as no one ever really asked her that often. Mostly they just let it be, assuming it was the experiments that were to blame. They would be right too. Val thought that maybe they hadn’t connected some of the nerves properly and as a result her eyes couldn’t always process the images before her. At least she didn’t see everything upside down. She remembered being taught in high school that your eyes saw everything upside down and sent messages to your brain, which switched everything right-side up again. It would certainly be worse if her eyes weren’t even capable of doing that much. “Hmmm?” Valeria murmured, looking around herself, still unable to see properly. Instead she let her ocelot ears swivel slightly, listening for even the slightest give away. She thought she heard something very quiet, probably a few miles away, like feet hitting the ground. Val assumed that was the scout heading back to his friends. Things would get dangerous if they didn’t find somewhere safe. Instantly Valeria was glad Quick had found her. She only hoped that her trust in him would not turn out to be another one of her naïve decisions. “Alright. That sounds like a good plan. Thank you, by the way. I don’t know what I’d have done if you weren’t here.” w o r d s , seven hundred and thirty five t a g , quick taylor m u s e , mountain sound by of monsters and men n o t e s , finally found 30 seconds to stop studying and post. sorry for the wait!

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["Quick" Taylor]

Quick listened to Valeria as she mentioned how she seemed to be the one being chased, rather than the other way around. He could understand how that could happen with Anthros, since the Carna seemed particularly disposed against their kind. Quick thought about how ironic it would be to be discriminated against by those who were discriminated against by the whole world. Just the thought was enough to dishearten him. He didn't know how people such as Val could stand it. It was no wonder the Nakoma Tribe mostly kept to themselves.

"Well, with the Carna, all you usually have to do is give them one good lick across the jaw," he said, gently bumping his fist against his jaw line to demonstrate, "And they'll leave you alone. They're basically a Ring of bullies. They're predators of opportunity. If you show them that you're a hard target, they'll usually leave you alone."

A small smile crept onto his face when she mentioned how she probably would have joined Fallen instead of Bestia if the latter hadn't found her first. It was nice to know that they were still known as the most accepting Ring in the dome. It showed that they were properly doing their duty by holding on to their principals.

Quick's smile soon faded, though, as she began talking about how she couldn't see well sometimes, which was likely due to Keeper experiments. Having bad or no eyesight would really leave anyone seriously vulnerable inside the dome. The fact that Val was able to survive here even with such a handicap was amazing. He supposed he shouldn't be surprised, though. She had ran all the way there from Nakoma territory, after all. No ordinary person would be able to do that, especially without eyesight.

As she thanked him for saving her, he shook his head and waved it off.

"It's nothing really," he said, now leading their path towards the main Fallenring camp, "I'm only doing what any decent person should do in this sort of situation," he told her matter-of-factly, leaving no room for debate, "I couldn't very well just leave you there to die, could I?"

He walked in silence for a few minutes, contemplating this newcomer to Fallen territory. He hoped he wasn't making a mistake. She shouldn't be much of a threat, especially considering she seemed so timid.

"So, how'd you end up here, Val?" He asked her, looking over at her with a cheerful smile.....

[Valeria Kazakov]

Val nodded in response to the shifter’s thoughts on the Carna. It certainly seemed like a valid explanation. From what she knew Carna were all bullies and the way to deal with a bully is to disempower them. At least, that’s what she had always been taught by her father. “I suppose it’s good I’m agile then. Otherwise I’m sure they’d catch me every time.” Frowning, she looked away from Quick and back to the direction the Carna had fled in. The vibrations were beginning to fade and she assumed they were heading away. Or possibly they were regrouping for a secondary attack. She understood well enough that Carna and Fallen were at odds with one another. It was a wonder Fulsi were managing to stay out of it all for the time being. Or perhaps they weren’t and she just didn’t know about it. Nakoma were tucked away in their own little corner of the dome and as a result usually they were not aware of all the happenings within the centre. It was good to hear the Quick was so kind about it all. From what Valeria could tell, he did not find her to be a threat and was happy to help her. She wished she could say the same about all the other shifters she had met. The number of people that would attempt to kill her simply at the sight of her mutations was astonishing. Instead of trying to argue with him on the matter of her also trespassing, Val simply nodded slowly and offered a small smile as apology for the inconvenience. Walking beside Quick, Valeria tried to take in as much of the landscape as she could. Everything was still blurry but she could make out colours and shapes around her. Her feet picked up the vibrations of the figure next to her and she used that to both keep pace with him and stay on course. Her peripheral vision was terrible and so she could barely see him beside her. Instead she found comfort in the little ripples of movement that flowed through the space between them, as well as the sound of his breathing. Her ocelot ears had swivelled to perk in his direction, so that if he chose to break the silence she would hear. Valeria was slightly startled by the question but she quickly regained her composure and smiled back at the man. “That’s an incredibly long story,” she paused for a moment, trying to work out how to approach it best. “To make it short, my mother died in childbirth so my father raised me. After we moved to America from Russia, I found out I was a shifter. A few years later I made the mistake of telling my father. Turns out he had been working for UNIT all along. Next thing I know I’m part of the anthro project and then after a year of testing, thrown into this place.” She winced slightly as the memory of her father’s betrayal replied in her mind. That kind of thing was not easy to handle. He had been her only family and he had turned her over in a heartbeat. “But it’s not all bad I suppose. I learnt who my true family was. How about you?” Looking back at him, her lips curled up in a quizzical grin. His face was blurry, but she still assumed him to be a few years older than herself. Age always meant an interesting backstory and Val was intrigued about his.