Chasing Tunnelsnakes (Kireon)

[A]

Talubara walked quietly around the edge of the weyrbowl, eyes scanning the sky, the walls, the ground. Cerulean was on his shoulder, chattering and gesturing wildly. Images popped into Talubara's head of a tiny red fire lizard facing off against a tunnelsnake. The image was unfortunately lacking in detail, and how Rayla had even found herself a tunnelsnake to fight was beyond Tal, but Cerulean had come running with the report and Tal doubted the pillie possessed the intellectual capacity to make up a story like that.

For his own part, Cerulean seemed quiet pleased with the whole adventure. He was serving his lord and the little lady. Look at how gallant Talubara was, just as a prince should be, walking bravely into battle. And Cerulean standing bravely by his side all the while. And then he saw something. There she was, fighting against the glorious beast! A different glorious beast, but a glorious beast all the same. He gave a louder MssMss and pointed.

Talubara groaned. That wasn't a tunnelsnake...it was a wher. A big, bronze wher which was going to eat or maul his firelizard. Feck. He sprinted over.

Rayla had been chasing a tunnelsnake, as Cerulean had seen, when she stumbled across the wher. The mere sight of him had given the tunnelsnake the motivation it needed to escape, darting suddenly to the side and losing Rayla. Which made her mad. It had been her prey, her prize and she'd nearly had it. And it had been more scared of the wher than it had been of her, despite the fact that SHE'D been the one who nearly killed it. She'd been so, so close. She squawked at the wher, barraging his mind with images of her lost lunch.

[kireon]

Cilia. Why?

The simple question directed at his handler in the most pained, disbelieving voice was almost enough to unseat her entirely from the back of the oversized bronze. To her credit, she wasn't destroying his hearing with the shrieks of laughter that sometimes occurred when something struck her as particularly funny. But he could feel her barely managing to hold on to the straps on his saddle as she fought to keep herself upright, shaking so badly from the fit of silent laughter that had robbed her of breath and sense as she was.

He would not even consider repeating the things she had said to him, those terrible, awful things that had absolutely nothing to do with the kind of respect and conduct a Kinghandler such as herself should carry out. Oh no, she seemed absolutely determined to ruin any kind of chance of genuine respect and reputation they could possibly build by disrespecting him and otherwise displaying his best and most admirable traits as if they were flaws- all for her own amusement.

And he had tried everything he could think of to make her behave; there were only so many pair of carefully made boots that he could ingest and be rid of before she caught on to that trick and managed to get them in a place he could not reach even with the longest of his claws. Even threatening to remove her legs so that he would be the sole mode of transportation and freedom for her had failed to strike any kind of respect-fear in he- and he had even pursued the case by damn near swallowing her up to the waist before giving that angle up entirely.

Now he had a tiny, angry red something being an absolute terror in his face and chittering him for something he didn't even know he'd done and Cilisk was just done with the day. He drew his head back away from the red flit and gave her his most Unimpressed expression. She was far too tiny to be considered a threat to anything but his eyes- and he would catch her in the air before she had a chance to do such a thing.

Wiping tears away from her eyes, the blonde haired handler atop her poor, unrespected hulk of muscle and brawn caught the sound of footsteps rapidly approaching and grinned, leaning forward on the saddle to watch the panicked face of what was probably a Candidate, judging by his age, skid around the corner and approach. "Evenin'!" She cheerfully called out. "This your tiny red ball of fury?" As if it weren't obvious, but in the mood she was in, it was worth it.

Poor, poor unsuspecting candidate.