Baro Bird finds a Rock

[anaimapayne]

He looked down to the green under his stiff little feet. He liked his feet, they were good for stomping, and walking. He liked walking. He walked very well. He looked up an saw a songbird flit into a shrub. He could fly, if he wanted to, but he liked the ground, solid under his feet, and full of yummy things to eat. His bright yellow feet stepped confidently into the soft grass, the legs they were attached to the longest of any raptor. He sported black, gray and white feathers, with a long, diamond shaped tail. The last two feathers stuck out, as they were much longer than the others. His eyes were featherless except for small black feathers that acted as eyelashes. The bare skin was a bright orange, a persimmon color, and slightly wrinkly. His eyes were a dark reddish brown, pupils large to catch sight of prey in the distance. There were feathers that stuck out of his head, in a crest, that were reminiscent of the quills the old English used to use, when writing legal documents. Two of these were much longer than the others, drooping instead of standing at the normal attention. He strode along on his long, elegant legs, scanning the surrounding area, on the prowl. He was feeling snakey today, in a snakey kind of mood. He surveyed the area around him, and soon found tracks of a middling sized snake in the dirt. He followed these, strutting comically along, head turning every which way to locate exactly where the slither marks led him. He put down his foot and was set off balance. He made a small mewing noise, out of panic, and flapped his wings. He looked down, to find a rock. A rock! He liked rocks, rocks were nice. He nudged it with his bright yellow beak, and found it trapped by a wayward root. He picked at it, and freed it.

" Rock!!! You are being mine now! Let us play." He picked it up and threw it away from him, then turned away.

" One, Two, you must being hiding rock, i must not finding you. Four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten!" He turned and tilted his head, looking in the direction he flung it.

" Where are you being rock?" He strutted over in its direction, whole body tilted to the ground.

[MudBug]

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[atrb=background,http://i52.tinypic.com/fvhikg.jpg] Watch my moves! Read my mind! "Hear my voice!" Calbrach's tired feet appreciated the change from the everchanging forest floor of the eastern woods to the consistently soft, and plush grass of the western plains. Standing out clearly in the sea of green, a moving shadow across the land, he walked slowly following an invisible path to nowhere. More often than not Calbrach would have been blazing through this wide span of land, feeling like he was made of freedom. In this moment, however, he felt like enjoying the freedom to go slow. So often he found himself in a hurry for one reason or another, and right now that wasn't the case. It was a rare opportunity to go as quickly, or as slowly, as his legs could carry him, and he chose the latter. A small cry caught his ear, and he brought his head up and over to his left. Golden eyes scanning the horizon, he saw a lively looking creature in the distance. It was a bird of some kind. It looked much unlike any bird Calbrach had seen, for certain. It seemed to be having quite a time with whatever it was playing with, and given Calbrach's pleasant mood, it's easygoing fun brought a smile to his face. He decided to introduce himself to the western stranger, and walked casually just close enough to hold conversation. He didn't, after all, want to scare the creature. He imagined it could be startling if a large black feline suddenly appeared over a bird's shoulder. "Hello there! Looks like you're having a good time. I envy you. I could never find a simple rock that amusing," he said with a hearty chuckle.

[Stardust]

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[atrb=background,http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y105/evanyanka/azar_middle.gif] Azar felt as if she had been asleep for months. Summer always seemed to do that to her; her species was primed to thrive in the heat of the open savannah, but somehow those days upon days of identical burning sun felt like a trance. Today was the first day she had felt properly alive in a while--the autumn winds were just cool enough to alert all the hairs on her body to their presence, stroking over the short hairs of her pelt and the few scars that scattered like silvery-grey stars over her shoulders and neck. The powerful muscles beneath those scars and that pelt shivered and twitched, not with cold but with anticipation. Her nostrils flared, and she raised and lowered her head, testing the wind, hearing the hollow sound it made as it rushed between her two proud, tall horns, the faint tug of it against their solidity. The oryx began moving at a steady trot, listening to the sound of her own hoofbeats. The hard-packed earth and rustling grasses beneath her feet encouraged her, and she began picking up her pace, taking herself to a fine canter, watching the pebbles on the ground before her shiver with the vibrations as she got close. She supposed they lay still and shocked after her passing, and the thought made her smile, but she did not turn to look back. These were her lands. It was only appropriate. But where, she then asked herself, were her people? It occurred to Azar that she had seen neither hide nor hair of a clan member for days. While this was not too alarming, given the roaming nature of the people of the West, it was unusual. Just as this thought entered her head, her large, mobile ears caught the sounds of conversation, voices both high and low. She altered her course and her pace, trotting more cautiously over a ridge to find the pair, as different as could be: one the expression of sultry grace, the other long-legged and stilty, rapt in his...game? The second creature was a large, unusual bird. His motions reminded her for a moment of a water bird stalking its prey, but he was talking so constantly that he surely couldn't be hunting. Keeping an eye on the feline, she called out: "Did you lose something, Little Brother?" ((OOC: Hope you don't mind me throwing her in! Since she's the Chieftain of the Western Plains and all, it seemed appropriate. Yay, Western creatures!))

[anaimapayne]

[ i feel all left out, cause he doesent have a pretty table ._. and im no good at html coding or even dohtml ]

He squawked upon hearing the voice of the great cat. He turned, and every feather in his crest stuck up straight, except the two droopers, his 'special' feathers. He went stiff and keeled over, his spindly legs sticking up in the air. He raised his head, seeing that the cat was not attacking him, and hopped up. He surveyed the great feline. Black, blackblack. So much of one color. He snapped his beak a little, and tilted his body down. He remembered his rock. His glorious rock!! He bagan again to look for it, but this time a little differently. He kept his body facing the way of the rock, and kept going foreward, peeking from between his legs at the cat.

" Ohai!! Uhm, i am having Hidegoseek time with rock, You may join, but if you are finding rock, you are it and must go hide and wait for rock to finding you. Am very good at hiding from rock, veeery good. I teach you ho-" At this point in his monologue he stepped on his special feathers, and did a small somersault. He landed on his back, legs once again in the air. He grabbed at the air with his feet, flapping his wings. All of this was done in foot high grass, making it an interesting spectacle to behold.

" Halp!! im a turtle and i cant get up!!" He wailed, then made a choked cry of some sort. He righted himself.

" Rock!! I am falling on you and finding you!!" He picked it up in his beak, and was baed look by another voice. He turned to see a great four legged beast. It was big, bigger than him and the same general color scheme. He saw this with favor, for it was a vice of the Barungos to be a tad bit clannish. He hopped twice, twards the new arrival, rock in beak.

" Herh reheh roh he pfft, Oh i sorry, Rock." He apologized happily, after spitting out his hard won prize.

" You will play? I am it~" He tempted. He knew no one wanted to play if they were it, so he made it more appealing. He did not stop to ask who these creatures were, or if they were going to kill and eat him. He just wanted someone to play with.

[MudBug]

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[atrb=background,http://i52.tinypic.com/fvhikg.jpg] Watch my moves! Read my mind! "Hear my voice!" Calbrach laughed heartily, unable to contain it, when he saw the small bird's reaction to his arrival. He frightened it right onto it's back, legs sticking into the air. It seemed to instinctively play dead. An overreaction, to say the least, since Calbrach meant absolutely no harm to the spazzy little creature. "Don't worry, little guy. I won't touch a feather on you, promise." It looked back up at him, and seemed content with the presence of the large cat enough to go back to his strange frolic. It kept talking something about a rock, over and again. The old jaguar had never seen an animal so intrigued with a small hard lump as this bird. Calbrach noticed the arrival of a large Oryx to their strange little gathering, and realized it to be none other than the Chieftain of the western territories herself. Surprised to see her roaming along, with nothing more to occupy her than a rather out of place jaguar, and a rock obsessed bird, he wasn't quite sure how to react. She asked the strange bird if he had lost anything, and in response he suggested they all play a lovely game of... hide and seek? With a rock? It was obvious that this bird could amuse himself without anyone else's help, but Calbrach felt compelled to play along regardless. "How 'bout you go out and hide the rock, and we will try to find it, aye?" He turned back to the Chieftain and bowed his head, trying to look as nonthreatening as possible. How she could think him a threat after agreeing to play hide and seek with a rock, he couldn't imagine. But still, he smiled and nodded as he spoke with a friendly tone. "Good day to you, Chief!"

[Stardust]

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[atrb=background,http://i4.photobucket.com/albums/y105/evanyanka/azar_middle.gif] The bird in question leaped quite suddenly into the air, tumbling over onto his back as if he had been struck by lightning. Azar was briefly concerned that he'd suffered a heart attack just at the sound of the panther's voice, but almost as quickly as he'd fallen, the bird righted himself, as cheerful as if his startled reaction had never happened. Still cheerful, he heard her question and trotted over with a surprisingly smooth gait for such long, gangly limbs. Fast, too; very fast. If the creature could keep a single thought in his head long enough to repeat it to someone he might be a good scout, but the Chieftain was a bit skeptical of that so far. "You will play? I am it." A chuckle sprang up easily from the depths of her chest as she looked down at him. He seemed absolutely unconcerned as to who she and the panther were. He seemed, in fact, fearless, aside from being easily startled. Azar was trying to think of a polite way to point out that there was absolutely no way to hide her large, tall body even in the taller grasses of the plains when the feline came to her rescue: "How 'bout you go out and hide the rock, and we will try to find it, aye?" She nodded in a friendly way to the speaker, smiling when he greeted her in turn as Chief. It was good to know her power was recognized outside of the Plains lands; with such a democratic and, at times, chaotic method of electing the leader, it was often hard to be taken seriously by outsiders. That was something she intended to change. "Welcome, stranger. What's your name and where'd you wander in from?" Her long tail swished languidly behind her, and she turned her face to the bird, looking him in the eyes and adding: "And your name too, rock-finder. I am Azar Aditi."

[anaimapayne]

Baro Bird looked from animal to animal, hearing them both out. He tilted his head this way and that, the stiff feathers on his head bobbing slightly. His orangey yellow mask wrinkeled as he squinted.

" Chief? You cooking food? Cook Rock!" He hopped over to the oryx's legs and set the rock down beside a hoof.

" Rock is being good for you, makes you strong, or is that turtle? Are shaped the same way so they must be doing the same things." He cocked a brownish red eye up to her, his eyelashes a deep black. He stretched up, so that they were nearly level. He blinked his left eye then his right, then his right thrice in quick succession followed by two from his left.

" You think so, yes?" He was excited at the prospect of food, he hadn't eaten in hours, and that was a long time for a Baro Bird. Barungo's were notorious for thier love of food. They would eat anything put in front of them that even looked slightly edible. There were many a sour crop in that particular family, but female Barungos were taught in the art of healing very early on, to see that thier mates did not die from something they ate.

He clacked his beak platfully, blinking his right eye, then his left. There was something slightly...off, about this bird, but it wasnt all that bad. e was genuine in his trust, and pleasant, if not amusing to be around.

[MudBug]

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[atrb=background,http://i52.tinypic.com/fvhikg.jpg] Watch my moves! Read my mind! "Hear my voice!" The Chief appeared to take him for what he was, and for that he was thankful. He would have hated to had started off with suspicious glances and awkward manipulative conversation with someone as dignified as herself. She introduced herself as Azar Aditi; quite humble, in Calbrach's opinion. It was a pleasent surprise to not have to listen to a hefty aount of boasting and title dropping for the leader of the west. For some reason, he qould have expected her to act as though she always had something to prove. Perhaps that was the difference between male leaders and female leaders. Whatever the psychology behind the greeting, Calbrach warmly returned it. "My pleasure, your highness.. if that is what they call you in yuor own land? I myself have just wandered out for a change of setting. Foolish, I suppose, to wander strange lands on a whim," he said with a light chuckle. Calbrach looked forward to a friendly conversation about a new place, but the bird with the rock was at it again. He certainly was a fellow who knew how to get others' attention. Calbrach listened intently, but still had to piece together a puzzle of speech to understand what the little guy was getting at. Why did he ramble on about cooking to the Chief? It took Calbrach longer than it should have to realize the young bird had misunderstood the Chief to be a chef, but that hardly mattered. He rambled something about cooking rocks and turtles, all the while his eyeballs seemed to fight to get in sync with one another. Calbrach stood there with a look of confusion and childlike giddiness on his face, watching the ridiculous little bird. He wondered if the bird knew just how amusing he was, or if perhaps in his mind it was all gravely serious.