2022.07.03:Trouble at the Crag

2022.07.03:Trouble at the Crag
Attack at the Crag
IC Date	2022.07.03
IC Time	06:00
Players	Akio Reno Kohana Tinlin
Location	Deep Forest - West Crag
Prp/Tp	Part 1 of the Crag PRP
Spheres	Shifter
Theme Song	Champion - Three Days Grace

Some people eat breakfast at different times of day. The sun is up, it's around 8:30am. It's shining, and it's a clear blue sky. The trees are dancing in the wind as their branches sway over head. It's a good draft coming through with the promise of rain later in the late afternoon.

In the distance, Tin's faint voice within the Ancient Oaks property can be heard. Not all the words she's singing as she's at the waterfall and washing laundry with a tub, and an old fashioned washer board. It's only when the wind picks up that it even sounds female.

A small distance away, two small Wendigo children around the ages of five or six race through the trees. They are laughing, and the sounds of giggles as one chases the other can be heard with sharper senses. The two wear traditional Native American wear, the deer hide, and softer moccassins on their feet. They are headed in the direction of the Waterfall, most likely for a visit.

Somehow, the Philodox ended up as point wolf. Today, his senses are dialed up to twenty. He heard a gnat's far from thirty yards away and can tell you every animal that's been through here the last two days. It's positively preternatural! He finds the fox easy enough, no hiding from this nose. Well, patrol with two is better than one!

Akio is on patrol while in his koto form. The black-furred fox anthro has one tail with a white tuft at the end. In this form, he patrols the ancient oaks with a katana sheathed at his side. Sticking to the shadows until the wolf finds him. Laughing he nods, falling in step with him while speaking softly, "Hopefully things go well. It's been quiet as of late." With those words spoken he moves through the landscape, eyes on their surroundings.

Back at his camp, Kohana is looking around and calling for his children. Those little rascals are once again up to no good and getting themselves into trouble somwehere. He searchs cabin to cabin, asking some of the other kin of the Three Rivers if they have been seen. "As usual...they decide to go on adventures...probably to see Tinlin." he tells one.

There's a flash of green smoke that drifts upward along the tree canopy, blowing tendrils of snaky smoke upward. It's a sickly green, the color of mold that ferments on too old bread. At first, it might seem like it was nothing. It dissipates once the wind gets ahold of it. But then another plume goes up, and another, and another.

And then the sound hits, of a whiffling device. It sounds metallic and sharp. And then pluff, pluff, ploof. Something is off. The scent rolling between the ancient thick trees, smells damp. The mold like smell gets intense, and then plumes of green smoke are begin ignited across the forest floor as if someone threw a device that scattered, and then dispensed. Something... chemical.

Quicksilver skids to a halt. He woofs at Akio and his comment about things being quiet. But his ears suddenly flatten and his hackles rise. He growls and sneezes again. Wait, there were children! Moves Like Quicksilver sniffs and turns his head, ears perking up. He howls a warning and then starts running as fast as he can towards where the children were! For those that speak Lupus, <<KIN IN DANGER>>

The sounds, the smells they hit him as Quicksilver warns of the danger and the children. Akio draws his sword and then takes off at a fast run. Even on two legs in this form he's still fast and he bolts after Quicksilver to look for danger, looking for the enemy to strike first.

As Quicksilver makes the move to run for the children, he will notice small metal canisters on the ground where green smoke is fanning out in small pools, as they appear to be smokey traps. The longer they are on the ground, the wider the spread of the green gas like smoke.

The children can no longer be heard laughing. But he doesn't have to go far before he spots one child laying face down on the ground underneath the green haze. The other child is a few feet behind, slumped over a big tree root. The green haze now covering them both. And standing not six feet away, the quiet footsteps of a male figure approaches them wearing all black, with a rifle slung over his shoulder. He's got a vest on where more canisters should sit in pockets, but his are now empty. All dispensed, his form can be seen moving through the green mist now, wearing a gas mask and unshouldering his rifle. He has sores all over his shaved scalp.

The raiding assailant aims the rifle at the first kid on the ground, and nudges him with a steel toed boot.

There is a crack of thunder across the sky, a flash of blue lightning. Only this time...the lightning doesn't come from the sky at all. It comes from Kohana. The tattoo of Wakinyan Tanka suddenly begins to glow a vibrant white blue, lightning arcing across the homid Wendigo's body. "Inside your homes! Everyone! Lock down! Cover the windows!"

His body erupts now, not just from the lightning arching across his form, taking on the hispo form. A powerful direwolf, more frightening as lightning flows from its gaze, now moving to run the perimeter, desperate to find the threat...and his children.

At the Crag someone shouts from within the Three Rivers encampment, "Green mist coming in through the rocks!"

And then another shout, "Sentinel down!" Two kinfolk adults, male and female from the Wendigo tribe take off running from the entrance as instructed. One drops a basket as they take shelter further within, and the other holds their hand over their nose and mouth.

Seeing the situation and looking to Quicksilver and seeing how he wants to rush in, Akio howls and yips loudly swinging his sword as he runs to the right trying to hit anything he passes with his sword to draw eyes and attention away from Quicksilver as he calls out a challenge to all their foes cursing their families and screaming as loud as he can.

A low whistle of some sort, almost a true howl comes from Kohana, and as he does so the wind joins the thunder and lightning. The wind comes in strong, no light breeze. Such is the Wendigo's gifts by the great wind spirits. <<You dare to attack my children?!>> he growls out, to a unknown enemy.

In the distance, Tinlin mindlessly keeps singing and washing laundry in the water tub. The loud sound of rushing water drowns out most of the noise going on not too far away. At one point, she looks up as Akio howls, but did she really hear something? She shrugs, and goes back to washing a pair of socks with a big bar of soap. She sings a pirate chant. It's bawdy, and horrible. Only one who can possibly hear it? Reno. But he's busy.

Oh, there's no drawing attention away from Moves Like Quicksilver. He's running like his tail's on fire, howling <<KOHANA!! CHILDREN!!>> Kohana knows that wolf's howl. But as he gets into the mist, he vanishes for a second or two ...

Then you see this wolf leap into the air and you'd think this guy can fly. He's got a high arc going and as he gets closer to the guy nudging the child, he growls and shifts to WarForm, forcing his body to twist in the air.

The intruder swivels and the gaping head is quirked at the neck in an odd shape, as the black gas mask now peers back at the trees in Akio's direction, as the Fox makes a racket with his sword. But it's almost too late, as he bends to peer upward at something ELSE flying in at him. The rifle at least is no longer pointed at the one kid, but an uneasy trigger finger, sends a bullet spraying randomly up into the tree canopy. And it's... loud. Like someone shot a fucking deer.

A new wind sweeps toward the direction of the children and the gas masked intruder. It's flowing out from the Crag itself, summoned by the Chief of the Three Rivers. It swirls through the trees, sending the leaves to bend silver, and then rushes through turning pine needles in a sworl, as the gas begins to disperse. It's thinning, right about the time Quicksilver is a split second from making contact with the really bad guy with the rifle.

There's the sound of another *BAM! Rifle fire. It's coming from another direction then where Quicksilver is attacking with Akio in pursuit to assist. The sinking feeling of there being more than one predator out here is painfully obvious. Yet, Kohana is fiercely fast, as his children are noted to be in danger! The bullet misses him and ends up lodged into the bark of one tree. This might piss off the tree spirits later.

You can see the wolf flying through the air! It's not hard for Kohana to track where the children are! His howl turns into a roar of anger as he melts from wolf to Warform in midair. He twists his body, twirling around as he smashs clawed foot into the Assailant's face, knocking his mask off. But the spiral doesn't stop till Moves Like Quicksilver comes around and swipes with a claw, dropping to land in a crouch, watching the body hit the ground.

Another predator lays on a thicker branch up in a tree, with a secondary rifle, and gas mask on. Two of these guys match. Two of them had vests with slots for chemicals, that are now empty. And he was camouflaged up on his tree with netting with leaves. When Kohana does find him, it's by the glint of the glass in the goggles of the mask. It's not prime military grade. This is trash wear from a local survival hub thrift store. He's thirty feet up from the ground.

Akio follows behind Quicksilver as he downs the assailant and slashes him clean in two while running past. Swiping his blade to clean the blade he looks around and nods towards the kids asking, "We clear?" With the blade in hand he looks for Tinlin too, making sure she's safe.

There's two passed out children on the ground. They both seem to be breathing, but when examined, they'll reveal reddened and burned skin by their noses, ears, and their eyes. They appear to be poisoned, but not dead.

The Wendigo warrior flashes lightning across his body from the hispo wolf as it leaps into the air. Rage. The Wendigo warrior is a warrior of ancient times. Isolated in his upbringing deep in northern Canada. He was taught to fight in the old ways. The primal ways. Ancient spirits and powers called upon to serve Gaia and protect the Pure ones....particularly their kids.

So as he leaps he grabs hold of the sniper, ripping at the flesh and swallowing it down. Drinking of the blood as he accepts the gifts of the canibal spirits. Noone dares to harm his children.

A small distance away, at the waterfall, Tinlin heard the gunshot go off as she queezes water out of the pair of socks, then drops them as soon as she hears the second shot. She goes running or the cave to take shelter. There shouldn't be rifle fire this close to home!

Raking his claws against the assailant one last time, Moves Like Quicksilver carefully scoops the children up and begins running towards the closest big ole tree. At just the right moment, he launches himself into the air. Is this fucker crazy? He lands in the tree, running down a limb to lose some of his momentum. He stops and starts with the girl, using Mother's Touch on her. Then the little boy. He's hovering so that any shots will hit him and not the children.

He's dying. The gas mask is mangled as he's chewed on by the Wendigo and he doesn't even get a moment to yell out. And his blood tastes acrid, like a fetid cancer of chemicals, and fast food eating. Blood and gore soaks them both as he is mauled, and tossed around up in that tree! But at the same time, he's able to pull a pin, and whiffles of other pins chained to it, all go at once from under his vest.

This is bad. Very bad. There's two choices now, KILL HIM and finish it? Or get the fuck away, from whatever he just pulled pins on. Three seconds.

3 2 1

The little girl takes a soft breath to gasp for clean air once Mother's Touch is used. The wounds on her face begins to heal, and she slowly opens her eyes and makes a soft cry.

The Wendigo warrior leaps down from the tree and makes a run for it, he lands with a crackle of that lightning acrosss the muscular frame. He moves quickly away from the uncoming explosion. Looking to make sure there are no other threats, the Ahroun is in true primal warrior zone.

Meanwhile, Akio makes it to the Ancient Oaks, and he'll have to call for Tinlin to come out. She will, and then without words she'll follow him wherever he pleads for her to assist. But now without grabbing her yellow umbrella with a purple handle off the top of her fireplace. She opens it up with a whoompf like Mary Poppins. She looks far too serious, for anyone to question her about umbrellas being stupid at a time like this.

BOOM!

Tinlin and Akio stop short on the path leading back to the fight. If something explodes, she backs up and grabs ahold of Akio's shirt. Her head shakes, no. She mouths, "Grenade?" not vocally, but he should be able to read lips. Fear moves through her very quickly.

The explosion ripples up in the trees in the circumference where the body parts explode outward. The splash of red, and ripped bone fragments go massively flying through the tree leaves like shrapnel. It's far enough away from Quicksilver and the kids, that they aren't in danger by it. But there is the backsplash of a human leg that drops to the ground, and it rains bits of skin, and intestines toward the earth. It's absolutely disgusting. Fragments of cloth he was wearing is now torn to shreds, tiny bits on fire still until they go out from the wind blowing through. The tree is gored, splintered where the explosion hit the hardest impact, and there's a loud cracking of the branch as it begins to also fall to the ground as a secondary aftermath a second later.

Reno leans over the children to protect them from the blast, and maybe to save himself from falling out of the tree from the earth shattering Kaboom. He leans forward and kisses the boy on the forehead as well. The healing gnosis flowing from Reno to the child. He then takes the time to check them both out, for further issues. If all is good, he grins at them, "Ready to fly again?" Let's try to make a game of it!

Kohana transforms into a human

The little boy awakens after he is healed and he also takes a small lungful of breath. He looks up at Reno in awe and looks slightly confused as to everything that has happened. His sister, is quicker on the uptake, as she was awake moments before her brother. She nods to Reno, she is ready to fly again. Boy, those kids will be in so much trouble when Dad gets to them!

The dire wolf is moving fast towards Quicksilver, "Where are my children?!" the warrior asks. Now in homid, his muscular chest is covered in blood. Pants and shoes only, all he is wearing now. "Tinlin?!" he calls out as well for the Fianna kinfolk.

Akio checks for the all clear, before bringing Tinlin in. He'll call out for his patrolling companion first, and then tote the fianna kinfolk along to see if they can help.

"Over here!" Reno calls out. He carefully picks both children up. Stargazers and that Balance. He steps away from the trunk of the tree and says, "Can you say Yeehaw?" If they do, he'll leap into the air, changing to crinos midflight to land easily. He melts back down to Human form, like .. Quicksilver. He lets the children down, "Go to your father." He tells them, but he stays with them.

The moment Tinlin hears Kohana call her name, she begins to run in his direction. Akio calls after her, knowing she's safe now, and asks her to help as she can. He wants to patrol further out, and see if there's further danger. She will agree, and then the two part ways. 

Tinlin looks at the gore all over Kohana, "What happened?" The obvious question, and then she turns to hear Reno. 'Where's the twins?" Her heart sinks, hoping they are alive.

The twins repeat, 'Yeeeeee hawww..." And then they are released, to run right toward Tinlin's skirt and legs to hug her. DAD, must be scary with all that blood and guts. She hugs them back, and then motions for them to go to Kohana. Clearly, she understands they've been mischievous lately, and this is exactly why they shouldn't run off.

Kohana returns the hugs of his children, squeezing them close to him which of course gets some of the poor hunter's blood on them. "You two...run along home. Be glad your mother went north to the Three Rivers if she knew you ran off..." he chastises. There is still a primal rumble in his tone, the feast of blood coursing through him.

"Tinlin." the Wendigo goes to her next, "Are you ok?" he looks her over and is about to hug her but then looks down at himself as he is coated blood. "I'll spare you the mess...you and my children had me worried." he growls at her, not angry, its just...his voice now. "I think you should stay at the Craig...safe, and where my children won't run off looking for you." he suggests.

Walking over, Reno's face scrunches up and he makes a gagging noise. He walks over to the corpses and then back to Kohana, sniffing him too. "Wyrm taint." He shows the brand to Kohana. "I need to cleanse everything."

Tinlin isn't going to hug Kohana until he takes a bath. Because after Reno announces Wyrm taint, she looks at the group now and knows they will need to be circled up. "All of them need cleansing. Both of you, and the kids. Akio as well, and he'll need to be summoned back to sit in the circle, if possible.

"Aye, of course. Whatever you need. I'm so glad you are all safe, and no one was seriously hurt. I can escort them to the crag, but lets get this done first, yes?" She thinks they must be overwhelmed. The kids just made this hard to see in the thick of it. "We've not been attacked out here like this before. It's the first time. Why now?"

"Hard to say what caused the attack." Kohana begins, "Newcomers..." Akio and Reno, "Aowyn's departure to the north? Random? We will have to learn more."

Begining the process, Reno goes about dragging corpses to a pile. "Help me cleanse this, and then I'll take care of you and the children." Reno says to Kohana. Yep, he just took charge. He then stops and bows his head to Kohana, "If it will please you Stormbreaker'rhya."

Akio will return to help and assist with holding things for cleansing and for the body clean up. He can shovel whatever is needed, and Tinlin will help as long as Kohana gives the ok.

Gathering things, digging holes, cleansing the children and everything else, Reno is spent. He looks positively exhausted. He sits down on the ground, pushing the hat back on his head a bit. Everything getting cleansed took all his strength. He looks to Tinlin, "You okay Miss Tinlin?"

Tinlin looks dirty now from helping to dig holes. But the worst of the grime has the soil turned over so that no one could notice something awful happened here. "Aye,' her face is smudged as she looks over at how exhausted he is. "Ye did well, saving those two little ones. I dinnae know what we'd do without you and Akio if you weren't here to help in time. I can't even think it." She thunks her shovel into the ground to rest on the handle. "Are you alright?"

Reno rubs his face, taking a deep breath. "That took everything I had in me." He gestures to the graves. "Once the Beast decides to go to sleep, it's gonna be lights out." he says with a smirk. "I haven't scrapped like that in a while. Felt good, to be honest."