Konan - Mount Reikaku

[Kaivi Silverwing]

"Gee, it's so nice to know my brother's opinion," Mika 'said,' rolling her eyes as she did, "I did it because we're going to the Capital today. The Priestess of Suzaku is finally here." She smiled a little. She still needed to check on the Priestess. But, as much as she hated to admit it, this was something that wouldn't wait.

Hearing his comments about how she wasn't the boss, made her lip twitch, the only external sign of her annoyance. She shook her head, chuckling. "You know that I am going to change that."

Without warning, Mika bolted, running as fast as she could towards Drive. Where he was strong, even without his powers, she was a little bit quicker than most. As she ran, she was about to draw her fan but decided against it. She was going to take Drive down without a weapon.  

[MeAndUinDabedRightnow]

Drive not only knew what she was going to do, but expected it. He knew his sister all to well. She was hot headed, and quick to anger. He couldn't think of one time when she had used her head in one of their fights. Not that it really mattered to much. Even with her feisty spirited fighting tactics, more often than not, he won. Yes, he admitted he had lost to her a few times, though only because of lucky shots. He wasn't going to make the same mistake again.

Once she drew near enough for his foot to reach her, he did so. Drive landed an upwards kick, hitting her just below her ribs. He knew where to strike to cause her the least amount of pain, but give her the ultimate lift. As his sister flew upwards, Drive moved to the side just enough to cause him to be drawn to the blade. Using all of his strength, he tossed it back to the chair, taking him with it.  

[Kaivi Silverwing]

Mika was a bit surprised about what Drive did. How he knew she was going to rush didn't make sense to her, and the kick to the stomach stung. Her brother had used enough strength to quite literally put her on the ceiling. Luckily for her, she twisted herself so that her feet were spread on the ceiling, and one hand was touching the ceiling. She used that position to push herself off of the ceiling, increasing her speed.

The main hall had a very high ceiling, so by the time she pushed off, Drive was already tossing the blade back, much to her confusion. "Huh? What the heck is that?"  

[MeAndUinDabedRightnow]

Drive chuckled, looking up at his sister and her confusion. He knew, with her push off the wall, that she would be coming down rather quickly. Putting up the flat of the sword to catch her upon it, he answered her question with a smirk. "It's a new blade. What does it look like?"

With a thunk and a bit of pressure, he could tell his sister was know on the flat of his blade. Since it was two feet across, she could quite easily lounge on it without much of a problem. Though, once she smacked onto it, even he could feel the sting. He smirked, as he began to spin the blade over his head. It took only a moment, before Mika went flying across the room and smacked into a wall, which he felt as well. "Are you ready to give up?"  

[Kaivi Silverwing]

As soon as Mika saw him lift his blade as she descended, she started to wince. It was going to hurt, and she knew it. Luckily for her, Nuriko was a healer. She had a distinct feeling she was going to need to speak with her afterwards. She was only thankful she was struck with the flat of the blade, rather than the edge, and that she had contorted her body so that she wasn't hitting it head first.

"It looks... and feels... quite painful..." she 'said' to him, before he started spinning her. Normally, she would try to grab the thing spinning, but considering it was SHARP, Mika wasn't going to do that, and let herself fly against the wall. Thwacking against the wall, she slumped down, wincing even more. "Yes... I give... you're the boss... now help me up, please?"

((No, this fight wasn't godmoding. Ookami and I have had this fight planned out for a while now.))  

[MeAndUinDabedRightnow]

Nodding, Drive strapped the blade to his back after standing up. He walked over to her and took her hand. After helping her stand and helping her back over to the seat, Drive put her down in the chair to his right. "Ah... it's good to be the boss again. Now then, what did you say about the Priestess of Suzaku?" He had been a bit too preoccupied dealing with her rather than listening to what she had actually said.  

[TionneDawnstar]

Tamahome smiled at the interaction. "Aw, Nuriko your blushing! You sure are lucky to have a future Emperor doting on you. You should let him do things for you, I'll bet he nevers gets to be independent." Tamahome looked over to Riku for his reaction.  

[RikuHeartless]

Chiriko grinned, "Yeah Nuriko, who else is going to get the chance to be pampered by such a beautiful, rich and powerful man! Enjoy it!" He giggled, getting up to get his breakfast. He took two helpings of the healing soup, he always needed help in the morning.

Riku's cheeks darkened, but he took it in stride. It actually made him feel good that they would joke with him, like he was just one of the guys. They didn't treat him differently, and that was a relief to the Prince. "Now now, do not make poor Nuriko blush, if she wishes to do things herself, I will certainly not make her let me serve her. I can not force someone to change their mind." He frowned a bit, feeling that lesson had come from somewhere else. "She is an indepentant woman, and certainly doesn't need me to help her. I am sorry if I offended you." He looked to her, a bit worried.  

[Assassin_of_demise]

Kyo watched the fight from a distance with a smile on his face. After the fight he went to find Riku. Upon finding him Kyo dropped down to one knee and bowed his head his hood was up and the symbol of the Konan Royal Army was on the back of the cap. "Prince Riku I am Kyo the head Royal Army. I am here to tell you that I am leaving the Royal Army as of right now. I do not wish to cause problems between nations with my actions."
After he finished his sentence he rose and the symbol of the Royal Army disapated and Kyo went to find Drive. Kyo approached him slowly and nelt down before him. "May I ask for a minute of your time? I would like to talk to you about joining your bandits." Kyo didn't rise but awaited an answer.  

[Aleyn of Farronbrook]

"No, not at all, Riku," she smiled and laughed with the others. "Well, I guess I'm just not used to pampering. My brother and I ran the house once our parents . . ."

She cut herself off and sipped her soup, a slightly downcast look in her eyes.  

[Aiyana Chepi]

"How many times do I have to tell you, Huo? It's dangerous to be naked in unfamiliar territory!" Li chided her as she washed in the stream. It felt good to get the road dust and grime off, as it had been three days since her last bath. Though it was a rather difficult thing to keep up with when on the road, Huo loved to keep as clean as possible. Even if she had to resort to just a simple swim, she was happy.... But she loved swimming anyway, so that didn't really matter too much.

"And how many times do I have to tell you you, Grandfather? I'm a big girl, I can take care of myself. Clothing or no." She responded, somewhat exasperated by her over-protective cat. "Besides, this will only take a few more moments. I'm almost clean."

Li harrumphed, which sounded more like a sneeze coming from his little cat body. It was always a bit of an imposing sound when he was human... But now that he was in the body of a cat that was just barely older than a kitten... It was just plain cute. "I still think you're making a big mistake, young lady..." He said, annoyance clear in his tone.

Huo chuckled to herself as she dried off. "You worry too much." She told him, patting her bottom dry. She couldn't see it, but she knew that the mark of Chichiri was glowing on her left buttock. It was always glowing, as she could never seem to turn her power off... Not that that was a bad thing. At least she didn't have to worry about over-heating, which was a good thing in a world where the sun never set.

"Huo..." She heard Li mutter in a cautionary tone. She just waved at him. It was just another of his lectures, she was sure, and she wasn't in the mood to hear it... But as she gathered her clothes, she heard a twig snap behind her. When she turned, she was face to face with a group of strong-looking men, both of whom had weapons pointed at her.

"Um... Hello gentlemen..." She said uncertainly, covering herself as best she could with her clothing. "Can I help you?" She asked, eyeing thier weapons. She didn't take well to being attacked, so she hoped that they had a good explaination for it... She didn't want to have to hurt them unneccisarily.

"Put your clothes on. You're coming with us." One of the men said gruffly, moving closer to her as he held the point of his sword between them. "And don't try anyfing funny." He added, his eyes roving over her hammer, which was leaning against a nearby tree.

"Oh, I wouldn't dream of it..." She said, her eyes narrowing. "Might I ask why I am being taken hostage?" She demanded as she pulled on her leather shirt and breeches.

The first man just snorted and nodded to the others to grab her hammer and horse. Two others grabbed ahold of her arms. "Don't do anything stupid, Huo." Li cautioned from inside her saddlebag. "If they wanted to kill you, they probably would've attacked you already."


"Easy for you to say..." She muttered, glaring at the two men holding her as they started to drag her away. "Just who do you think you are?" She demanded loudly, giving them all venomous looks. "Do you even know who you are dealing with here? I could crush you like bugs! Or something like that..." She said, growing even more cross as she realized how foolish her threats sounded.

As they moved farther along through the forest, she felt herself getting more and more annoyed. She wasn't generally an easy person to get to, but when it came to being kidnapped, she wasn't one to stand for it. The only thing keeping her from fighting back was Li. And he wasn't helping her annoyance.

"Huo, will you just shut up? Your protests aren't going to do anything!" He hissed at her. "Oh, shut up, Grandfather. Obviously you don't understand the gravity of our situation! We're being kidnapped." She snapped, glaring in the direction of her horse.

The group of men stared at her, then started as a black cat jumped out of the bag and onto the saddle itself. "I think I understand it better than you do. Do you know where we are, little Chichiri?" He demanded of her, giving her a scholarly look. She glared at him. "This is Mount Reikaku... And these are bandits. I told you that being naked in unfamiliar territory was dangerous business." He said in his all-knowing sort of way.

Huo grumbled. "Know-it-all... Why didn't you say that in the first place?!" She demanded of him, struggling against her captors.

"Just who are you talking to?" One of the men holding her demanded, tightening his grip and giving her a shake to make her stop struggling. She ignored him, looking around instead. They had broken through the trees and were now in what appeared to be the bandit camp... She hadn't realized just how close to it they had been.

"This is all your fault, you know." She said loudly, glowering at Li. "If you had just told me where we were in the first place, we wouldn't be in this mess. "OW! You're hurting me!" She shouted as the men holding her tightened thier grip. "I smell food..." Li commented suddenly, appearing to ignore her.

"Food? FOOD?! We've just been taken captive by bandits and your thoughts are immediatly on FOOD?! Gods, you're becoming more of a cat than I realized! Shall I start calling you kitty from now on" She yelled angrily. "Mind your temper, Huo... Wouldn't want to lose another set of clothes." He retorted. She just responded with an angry yell and began kicking biting her captors.

One of the men grabbed Li and held onto him as they entered a large room, Huo still kicking and biting her captors whenever possible while yelling insults at them and angry retorts to her cat. Suddenly and without ceremony, they found themselves on the ground, face first in front of a man and a woman. "This is all your fault, old man." She growled, glaring at Li. "You know that, right?"

"Shut up, Huo... Do you want to get yourself into more trouble than you're already in?" He retorted. As they argued they were both completely oblivious to the goings on over thier heads.

"Found her just a short hop from camp, Boss." The first guard was saying. "Was somethin' we saw that made us realize we should bring her to you instead of killin' her, though..." He said, nudging her with his foot. "She had a mark kinda like yours glowing right on her bum. Figured you might wanna talk to her." He said, giving Drive and Mika a lop-sided grin. "Also figured you could make some sense out of this..." He said, motioning towards the girl that was, apparently, having a one-sided argument... With a cat.

((Sorry about the length, everyone... Don't worry, the rest won't be nearly so long. biggrin ))  

[RikuHeartless]

Riku sat a comforting hand on her shoulder and smiled, "It's ok, I understand. Perhaps I can do other things for you that would benefit you more anyway."

Chiriko was already mostly through his food, he had been starving, then once he was finished, he got seconds.  

[Aleyn of Farronbrook]

Lian smiled and fought the urge to abandon her food and hug the Prince. She instead raised an inquisitive eyebrow at Chiriko.

"My, looks like someone's hungry today," she smiles. "How's do you find the soup?"  

[TionneDawnstar]

Tamahome looked up from this breakfast when he heard yelling. "What's that?" he whispered and got up, heading toward the sound. He peaked in the door and saw a blond woman before a man and Mika. He frowned when he saw Tauski, it looked as though she was hurt. He stepped in the room, since he was part of the bandit gang, at least according to Mika, but he wasn't too worried about the woman, but it pained him to see the sweet red head hurt again.  

[Kaivi Silverwing]

"The Priestess of Suzaku... she's here. Right now. Tamahome should have taken her to my room so she could have gotten some rest. I was going to check on her, when you just so happened to call. Not to mention almost all of the other warriors are here, with the exception of Mitsukake and..." she had been in the middle of 'speaking' with her brother, briefing him on what was going on when Kyo came in and bowed to Drive. She figured she would let HIM handle that part, particularly since right behind that was five of the bandits carrying a rather unhappy blonde. "Chichiri..." Mika finished before turning back to the bandits. "I'll deal with her. You may go. Leave her things."

Once the five men were gone, and Drive was dealing with Kyo, Mika slowly stood, and limped over to Huo. "So... you have a mark... What is your name? And why," she said looking over at the feline, "are you talking to a cat?" She let her eyes wander up, to where she saw Tamahome. Her heart started beating quickly as she looked at him, so she averted her eyes in an attempt to slow it. "Well? Who are you?"