[PRP](PLOT) You Should See The Other Guy (Nimriel and Nyra)

[Doof]

Amongst the many rooms of the healing house, there were few as closely watched or as meticulously tended as the wards given to the infirmary, where injured pae whose wounds were not life-threatening were able to rest and recover. Fairies flitted around in an orderly fashion, keeping respectfully silent except when it was necessary to ask how one of their charges was doing, or to offer words of comfort. The injuries they faced were not as horrific as those found nearby in critical care, but they treated them with no less importance.

A few of the patients bore some very distinctive wounds, caused by fangs or claws that were of no ordinary creature.These were the ones who had encountered a Dragnid beast, and were lucky enough to be physically able to talk about it. Whether or not they were emotionally ready to talk about it, however, was a different matter, as one visitor was finding out. A silver-skinned demon walked amongst the beds, not giving company, but seeking knowledge from the recollections of those willing to speak of their experiences.

He scratched the back of head, before sliding his hand through his blue hair. He did not make much eye contact with the fairies, since most of them didn't take kindly to him bothering those under their care. The pair of girls he'd first approached were too traumatized to remember much, whilst the young male angel was perhaps a little too enthusiastic about how he managed to fight back a creature which then only just managed to escape before he could capture it. Not only was the story's authenticity decidedly in question, but the creature described was one he was already familiar with (something he had dubbed the 'Hellcat'). He noted with a little concern however that all these encounters had taken place at the fringes of Dragnid, where such vicious attacks had previously been unheard of.

The demon turned and quietly strode towards the last patient with signs of injury from a Dragnid beast. She was a feathered thing, of striking appearance, with piercing blue eyes and black and white markings. She was a pae undoubtedly, but of a kind he was not yet familiar with. He had a feeling he may have sighted one from a distance once, but that would have been the only time if he had not misidentified it, and it was clear that this girl was from a very rare breed. He cleared his throat as he approached her, announcing his presence so as not to startle her, although he suspected that she may have seen or heard him coming anyway. She had been looking bored and restless since he had entered the room, and more than likely had been eavesdropping on the other conversations. The male demon held his notepad and pencil before him, showing that he was there to talk about business, not for comfort or care.

"Young lady." He began respectfully, standing by her bedside. "I am Nimriel, my duty is to act as a researcher cataloguing the creatures from the tainted forest. They say you were brought in after an encounter with a Dragnid beast, and I was wondering if you would mind telling me about it, miss..?"
 

[Teigra]

Nyra had been spending her days either working on her latest trophies, or being a holy terror to the healers and other staff of the Healing Houses. She had to keep herself entertained somehow. Darn bugs kept fussing over her and wouldn't let her out of the bed yet, so she made her own entertainment. Fortunately, Kane had brought her the 'crafting supplies' she normally used to create simple trinkets from her trophies in the past before he'd left on his vacation/healing retreat/whatever it was. With as much time she had now, however, it looked as if she'd have something far more impressive than usual by the time she was done with her current projects.

The arrival of the strange demon to the ward, however, had formed a suitable distraction for now, and she'd set her work aside not long after he came in. He passed from bed to bed, asking strange questions and getting little to no (valid) information as a result. Her sharp hearing had no trouble picking up most of the conversations, and what she couldn't hear, her sharp eyes could see from reading their lips. He obviously wasn't there to visit any particular patient. Visitors to the ward weren't that unusual, but ones who didn't come to visit a specific loved one? Those were nearly unheard of. The demon represented a curiosity for the teen that she wouldn't let pass by. Entertainment was so rare. He seemed really interested in the monsters from the dark forest that had been the reason most ended up in here. Wonder why?

When the time came that the stranger decided to approach her, Nyra watched him with interest, though her stare was anything but reassuring. She behaved with all the mannerisms of a bird of prey, including the intensity with which she studied her object of interest, even cocking her head to the side as he began speaking to her. So many words, so many unimportant words. Why did Pae insist on talking so much? It was a question that plagued her constantly. Finally, he paused, as if expecting her to answer in kind. She preferred more brief replies.

A brief snort of air from her nostrils and she shook her head. "You talk lots. What you wanna' know?" She had no such problems talking about her experience...but she'd need more direction than 'talk about this subject aimlessly.' She didn't have the patience for that, even IF she had nothing better to do right now, other than lay around in bed while her leg healed.
 

[Doof]

Nimriel was initially taken aback by the young-ish girl's broken speech. She had seemed a little wild, but there existed the possibility that she spent most of her time outside society's safe boundaries. Her eyes wore the piercing gaze of a predator, and while he'd met much more terrifying stares, the gaze was a little unsettling coming from something that so closely resembled other Pae. He pondered briefly on whether or not this girl would be any help at all. He could understand what she was talking about, but it sounded like she wasn't really much for talking.

So be it.

The demon sighed and pulled a chair closer, leaning forward as he sat. "I want to know what you remember about the creature that attacked you." He held his quill to his notepad, ready to listen and record. "More than just what it looked or sounded like. I want to know how it behaved. How did it come at you? Did it stalk you silently or did it charge in?" Nimriel flipped to a page in his notepad that already had plenty of writing on it, to refresh his memory of the questions he was asking. It had been a slow day. "Just start with how you encountered it and where, how it attacked and from there go to what it looked, sounded and smelled like. And how it tasted, if for some reason you know that fact." Nimriel did not put it past this wild-looking girl to sneak a bite in, so he left that particular possibility open.

He flipped back to his blank page, and reached into a simple leather pouch, pulling out a stick of charcoal, suggesting the possible intent to make a sketch while his witness/victim/(aggressor?) described her encounter. The faintest traces of dust in the air caught bright beams of sunlight streaming through the tall, clear windows, and he positioned himself and the pad so that it sat in the light. What worked its way onto the blank pages would depend on the young feathered one.  

[Teigra]

Blinking owlishly at the stranger, momentarily overwhelmed by the amount of information he was asking for, Nyra eventually responded with, "That's lots." She supposed it was more direction than before though and watched with interest as he produced a number of objects before settling in to listen to her. Only when he was focused on her did she start telling her story.

"Beastie looked like a big, meanie face," she said matter-of-factly. Wait, that wasn't much of a physical description was it? Lots of people and animals could look like big meanie faces, but look like different big meanie faces. She scrunched up her face, her expression focused on calling up actual details from her memory and not just her impression of the creature. Details, Nyra...

She started over, starting the story from the beginning, since maybe recalling the events as they happened might help her memory. "Was hunting out on marsh. Kane said not to leave the forest, but pfft," she snorted dismissively. She could do what she liked, dammit. Besides, there was more room out on the marsh to practice flying without dodging trees and low-hanging branches. She could still only fly for short distances yet, but it was easier to focus on practice when she wasn't also having to avoid stationary objects.

Her eyes seemed to focus with a predatory gaze on the wall as she related her tale. "Beast attacked first. Rushed from side. Short legs though...short, but strong. Like a big ball of fur wrapped around a rock. Heavy, strong. Little beady eyes," she hissed, remembering the beast trying to climb the tree after her and the hate-filled stare they'd shared. "Four little short legs, short nose, sharp teeth. Growling, snarly thing. Stink like dead thing. Dead thing from many moons ago," she sneered, lip raised in disgust at the mere memory. "Charged and growled a lot, didn't like talons in its eyes," she snickered, wiggling the talons of her uninjured leg smugly. She'd learned that.

"Had short, sharp claws too," she added, then seemed to perk up, looking around her suddenly. She snatched up the claw from the pile of string and bones and teeth nearby that she'd been working with before Nimriel had arrived. "Like this one!" What she held out was a complete claw, torn free from the creature's paw. It lay in her outstretched hand, nearly the same length as the width of her palm.
 

[Doof]

Nimriel raised an eyebrow at the feathery youth's initial description of the 'meanie-face' that attacked her, wondering if this would be just another fruitless exercise. Well, some days he came away with a very good amount of research done, and sometimes he just made for a polite bedside conversationalist. This girl was clearly not raised in an educated manner, if she had been raised by anyone at all. Although it wasn't unheard of for youngsters to manage to somehow survive in the wilds and grow to adulthood with minimal contact with their civilized brethren, such cases were rare, and almost always resulted in socially stunted wildlings.

Such as this one.

And then, with a little reflection, she seemed to begin to draw details from the depths of her memory. Nimriel began to scribble notes in the corner of his pad, but kept his eyes on her as much as possible. He hadn't always been so mindful of his manners, but a few years of face-to-face interviews in the name of research had done much for his etiquette and bedside manner. He wrote down where she had encountered it, and how it moved to attack. Her description of its scent- rotting- was fairly consistent with most foul creatures of that cursed forest. From the physical description, however, it was clear that this was not a beast he had encountered before, or heard secondhand about. Not twisted and gangly, claws and spines, or sleek and deadly, but compact and powerful, filled with rage and ferocity. His note-taking was furiously quick, and popped his eyes up just long enough to see the girl produce the trophy of their encounter- a claw from the creature in question. It was tainted, no doubt about it, and it lent a great deal of weight to the veracity of her account. Not just that she had encountered it, but that she had indeed combated it and manged to get the better of it, at least long enough to retrieve this item.

Impressive.

"My, that's quite the claw." Nimriel looked it over. He was hesitant to take it from her, given the very good look he was getting as it was. "I suppose compared to your talons, this would be a short claw. But it certainly looks big enough to me." He turned his gaze back to the girl's eyes. "Or did you mean that this claw was short compared to the rest of its body?" His hand scribbled something onto the notepad. "For that matter, just how big was it?" He tilted his head, letting his curiosity show, and reminding the girl that he was genuinely interested in what she had to say. "Did it have shaggy fur, or short fur? Ears? Tail?"  

[Teigra]

Nyra beamed for a moment, proud that she seemed to have impressed the demon with her story and her trophy, Then, her expression faltered as she remembered it wasn't exactly her trophy. Looking down at the claw in her hand, she turned it over a few times in thought. "Not Nyra's trophy though. Kane's. Still good trophy though," she finished, seeming satisfied with that.

She realized the truth that the claw in her hand wasn't exactly short, not in general. "Was short when still in paws. Mostly hidden," she explained. "Longer when pulled out. But still shorter than Nyra's," she kicked her uninjured leg free of the sheets, holding it up to show off her talons. "Shorter than Kane's too, so 'short.'" Made sense to her. It was a comparison thing.

Peering curiously at the scratchings the demon kept making, the notes in the corners meant little to her, so she shrugged them off and continued answering questions. "Fur all messy with swamp muck," she shrugged, unable to say more than that as matted as the creature had seemed. "Short ears. Look kinda' like bear," she mused, "But...littler. And longer tail. All muddy though," she shrugged again helplessly. To be honest, she was doing good to have gotten that much with the way they were rolling in the muck before the creature started mangling her leg and trying to drag her away.

Maybe he'd be interested in that? He seemed interested in every little thing she said so far, so the hunter was enjoying telling of her escapades. Even if she could leave out some of the details of being dragged away maybe. "Nyra bloodied it up good 'fore Kane joined in. Beastie tried to take Nyra home to dark forest for dinner. Didn't like talons in 'is eyes," she cackled to herself.
 

[Doof]

Nimriel nodded, suddenly understanding. She'd had help bringing down that beast, whatever it was. He was mildly alarmed that this child was keen on taking 'trophies' from the most dangerous creatures on the island, but he supposed he'd conversed with stranger individuals over the years. At least he could actually believe that this girl held her own in her violent experience. Whoever this Kane was, he (she?) must have been a formidable fighter also, if they'd had long claws as well. Or perhaps Kane was some sort of familiar? In any case that was peripheral to Nimriel's current investigation. Perhaps later he'd inquire, if the feathery youth looked bored enough.

He considered what the girl added to her description. With retractable claws, fur thick enough to be considered 'messy' when clotted with mud, and features that vaguely resembled a bear's (a creature rare enough on the isle as far as he knew for him to suspect that this child had been well-traveled in her short life as to make the comparison), it certainly seemed like a new species based off that description.

Again.

He exhaled quietly as he reviewed his notes. "Well, this really is something." He put away his quill and drew out of his pouch a thin black pencil, drawing off to the side of his notes. For this he had to take his eyes away from his subject, and reached for an opportunity to make small talk while he sketched.

The silver-blue demon smiled with morbid amusement at the girl's wild laugh. Childlike in tone and pride, and yet attached to such a gruesome deed, and what would to many have been a traumatic experience. He liked this kid. If all children were like this one he might have actually wanted one. "You certainly did well for yourself. Just do me a favor and make sure that leg is back in one piece before you try to get the rest of its claws, hm?" Nimriel had a smirk and a twinkle in his eye, although he realized he probably shouldn't have been encouraging her.

A part of his mind wandered to the recent files he'd compiled over the last few months. It wasn't just bothersome that more creatures were appearing further from the forest, it was that fact that the size, power and variety of creatures was drastically on the increase. He'd have to do some sort of graph or comparison chart sometime to present to his peers.

Still needing a little extra time to finish sketching, he raised the question he'd been saving. "This Kane, he a friend of yours?" A thought occurred to him. "Is he here somewhere?"

And that bought him the time he needed. "Also, please tell me," He turned around his pad and showed the young girl the sketch he'd made. "Does this resemble what you saw in the marsh? Do I need to make any changes here?"

 

[Teigra]

No, the youth didn't need praises sung to her obvious fighting prowess, yet she soaked them in like a sponge, never considering that the demon might only have been teasing her. And she certainly didn't need encouragement. Already, her fighting blood told her to get out of this bed and go seek her revenge on the meanie face beastie. Her eyes shone with a feral light as she grinned back at the demon. "Leg still in one piece mostly. Beastie might wish it wasn't."

A whole necklace made of its claws...haha...

She shook off the thought when asked another question. Wait, what was he doing now with the paper and sticks? She watched the scribbles for a minute that he seemed focused on, yet he was still talking to her, so he was still paying attention even if he wasn't looking at her. She shrugged, immediately answering for Kane's whereabouts. "Eh, he's not here. On a trip," she shrugged. "Said he'd be back soon. Nyra stay here. With stupid fairies," she rolled her eyes to show exactly what she'd thought of this. Least she had time to work on her trophies.

She actually had to think for a minute before answering. No, Kane wasn't a 'friend' exactly. That wasn't the word she was looking for. She didn't really equate the concept of 'father' with him either. She knew that wasn't true and she frankly didn't care. He was Vika's dad, not hers, even if he'd sort of raised her. She looked up to him in a way...not like a parent, but as a skilled fighter. A strong, fellow warrior. Realizing that was as best an explanation as any, she nodded and offered. "Kane taught Nyra to hunt. To fight and feed herself. But, he not like Nyra. He like you." She paused, tilting her head at Nimriel, then cackling with amusement again. "Same colors even! But you backwards," she laughed, seeming highly entertained by this. Blue and silver demons everywhere! Maybe that's the colors they came in. Hmm..minus the green forest lady...

She blinked repeatedly as the pad was held up to her. What...was she supposed to see? Lines on a page? She took the pad in her hands, staring at it silently for a full minute. Then, she turned it upside down. Then, sideways. Then, tilted her head sideways. Frowning at it, she finally turned both herself and the sketch rightside up again. Something seemed to click inside her head this time and she realized she was looking at a picture! Flat on a page, but it was an image of something. Image of the beastie?

"Ooooh, paper beastie!" she exclaimed, proud of herself for figuring it out. Then, she resumed frowning at it, looking at the details. It looked enough like the thing in the marsh as far as she could tell, basically, though she muttered to herself, "sometimes it stretch out....low to ground rather than ball up, but other times like this too." She traced the sketch with a claw thoughtfully, then paused with one claw on its head, the other on its paws. She lifted her fingers like this and smirked at Nimriel like he'd said something silly. "Beastie bigger than this though, silly."
 

[Doof]

The tall demon nodded in understanding at the girl's rough description of her companion, Kane. A demon, with similar colouring to himself (although there was room for speculation on what she meant by 'backwards') and apparently the one that had taught her how to survive. The puzzle pieces around this wild youngling were falling into place. Whoever he was, it sounded like he would be a likely candidate for an interview himself- probably having seen far more of the corrupted creatures from Dragnid than the girl he was speaking to at that moment.

At first, Nimriel was concerned that his drawing was way off, since the youngster seemed to have such a hard time comprehending it. He exhaled with relief when she finally seemed to realize that it was a drawing of the creature she'd enountered, and nodded as she described the different stance she remembered. Low to the ground, makes sense. It was as though she had never seen a picture before. Nimriel wondered whether she had any education from 'Kane', or if it was all claws and teeth with this girl. He wanted to give the poor thing a damned book, but was certain she'd have no idea how to read.

The demon mentally did an eyeroll as she suggested the image on the page was smaller than the real thing. "Of course, I suppose you're right." He answered diplomatically, then pointed to the roughly drawn figure in the corner of the page. "But imagine this was a picture of me. If the beastie was next to me, is this how big it would be?"

This would about wrap up what he wanted to ask her. But there was one last thing he wanted from her, something he always asked an individual if they had discovered something new that he'd never catalogued or previously heard of.

"So what would you like to name this creature? If there are more of them, I mean. I know you could think of something better than 'Beastie' or 'Meanie-Face'." He chuckled. "I know there's probably several things you'd want to name the particular individual that you clawed up, but I'd like your thoughts on a name for them all."  

[Teigra]

Nyra felt a surge of satisfaction as the demon admitted that her observation had been right. Heh, as if she'd have anything to fear from a tiny beast like the one he drew. She peered at the other shape he pointed out in the corner of the page though, considering whether that shape could represent the demon that spoke to her. She looked him up and down, then back to the page, then back to Nimriel with a frown. It seemed to take some consideration before she answered. "You tall. So...maybe little bit littler. Not lot little. Little little." She looked at the page again, then reached towards Nimriel, holding her hands out towards his head as if measuring the difference. Then she pulled her hands back, held approximately half a head's height apart. "Little bit littler. When all balled up like in picture," she explained with a satisfied grin, proud of her observational skills.

She tilted her head at his next question. Name beastie? He wanted her to name it? Other than 'meanie face beastie', she hadn't really considered it. Why did everything have to have a name? Ugh. Well, she supposed it helped if there were more of them out there to know what they were called. And she wasn't naming this one in particular, that would be dumb. But, what to call it? This was a harder question for her than it should have been. Would someone else have come up with something easier?

Her brow furrowed in thought, her stare shifting back towards her injured leg. Something about how it looked...or moved maybe? Something that just...sounded right? That in mind, a couple of minutes later, she muttered, "Muckstomper." Then, a short pause and she added, "Or Mukpur." Sounded right. That said, she blinked, turning her head back towards Nimriel. Would that do? Was that what he wanted?
 

[Doof]

xp Nimriel turned the pad around to face himself once more, hastily adjusting the height of the little pae he'd drawn for reference. His eyes lingered over the page a little longer, imagining the creature as if it were real. Not as outright frightening as some he'd seen, but he perceived a ferocious creature that could avoid being seen if it so wished. Remarkable child this one, to have put up the fight she claimed to have done. Again the thought crossed his mind of a potentially embellished story, but Nimriel simply felt that she was rather earnest in her description, and there was the question of her little (but actually rather large) prize souvenir.

The scholar initially raised an eyebrow at the name 'Muckstomper' but then paused at the second suggestion. Mukpur, sort of had a little ring to it. He wrote the word, as he believed it ought to have been spelt. Under that he wrote some basic description, size, temperament notes, as well as the child's name. He began with an "N", but hesitated. "How do you spell your name, again?"

Nim paused, and reconsidered as he remembered who we was talking to.

"Actually, never mind, I'll figure it out." The demon wrote out, in slightly larger text, "Nyra", and blew lightly on his page one more time, before regarding it up and down. Satisfied, he allowed himself a slight grin and laid the pad down on his lap. Within Nyra's view was the image he'd just adjusted as well as the very neat and particularly precise script that was Nimriel's handwriting.

"You've been very helpful today, Nyra. Do you have anything to add?"  

[Teigra]

Nyra's eyes were drawn towards the quick sketching movements every time Nimriel leaned over the notepad. It wasn't the first time she'd seen writing before...she'd just never had much interest in it. However, the little pictures he drew...those seemed interesting. Little pictures representing real creatures...much less threatening, of course, but interesting nonetheless. Then, more words...he asked her something about her name, to which she only stared, following his motion back to what he scratched after asking her the question.

She stared when he laid the notepad down, at the two creatures, then the last bit of scribbling he'd done after asking her name. After a moment, she looked back up at the demon's question. Anything to add about the Mukpur? She shook her head. Not really, but she wasn't completely done yet either.

Pointing at the notepad in his lap, she asked, "You draw more beasties? Nyra wanna' see." Clearly, there were other meanies in the dark forest, after all, and if she were gonna' run into any of them some day, might help to know what they looked like. Right?

Not just cause she was interested in the weird book scribbles, of course.
 

[Doof]

With a slightly cocked eyebrow, the demon finalized his entry on the Mukpur, scrawling one or two last-second addenda to the bottom of the page, before he smirked at the youngster lying on her bed.

The improbability of the situation tickled him silly. Here, in the most unlikely of places, with the most unlikely of students, SOMEONE had finally taken an interest in his research. It didn't really bother him, but he found it oddly funny that he'd seen more interest in his work from this savage jungle girl convalescing in this ward than he had from dozens of academics back in Telrunya City (which was for all intents and purposes nil).

In a (for him) unfamiliar manoeuvre, he slid closer to the feathered girl and flipped back a page, showing the most recent entry before the Mukpur. "I suppose I have a while yet to spare. Maybe I can even tell you about the pae that ran into these creatures and how they say they managed to survive. However embellished. Don't worry, I'll explain what that word means."

He cleared his throat, and watched out of the corner of his eye, a pair of orderlies who were muttering to each other about the strange, well-spoken, impeccably dressed demon who had managed to hold Nyra's attention, something none of them had been able to do. Indeed, from a distance, it almost looked like any adult reading a story to a normal child.

Nimriel pointed at a picture of something that resembled a giant, multiple-eyed, tooth-beaked raven with obscenely long talons and a thorned, serpent-like twin-tail. He began telling the story in a soothing, bedside tone, leaning in and pointing at the page as he spoke, especially at some of the words as he spoke them, perhaps subconsciously hoping the youngster would pick up on the letters and the sounds they represented.

"This one we named a Razorbeak. The demon that flew into it was found floating down a river, mauled feverish and unconscious, but alive. By the time he was delivered here his wing was almost gangrenous, but by toil and miracle the staff here saved all of his limbs. It all began when..."

And from the thickness of his pad, storytime, it seemed, would go on for quite a while yet.