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 Posted: Sat Nov 21, 2009 7:48 pm
 Dimitri was staring down at his front hooves. His head low, curly hair constantly poking him in the eyes, he was making his way over frozen puddles. Some would crack under his weight and plunge his hoof into ice-water, but some would hold his weight, if they were thin enough and completely frozen. As he walked, with nowhere in particular to go, he caught his reflection every few seconds. Dark mane, dark bones, and those piercing green eyes staring back at him. What was on his mind? Well, even he couldn't say. Random thoughts floated across his mind, never really materializing, never sitting still. His thoughts kept getting interrupted by new ones. And so it went, this pacing, without looking where he was going, just staring into his own eyes, hoping to set his mind straight.
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Posted: Sun Nov 22, 2009 7:25 am
Just as this positive assessment of life had run through her mind, movement caught at the mare's attention and she came to an abrupt halt. Off to her left was an Aeri but... what was wrong with his back? Interest piqued, the pink-coated mare changed direction and set off towards the other Nequus. As she drew closer, her jaw all but dropped and she slowed to a stop once more.
"Wow!" she exclaimed once the initial shock had worn off. "Who was it, and what did they do to piss you off?" A skeleton, a partial skeleton, adorned the stallion's back... Why was it grey rather than bone coloured? How did it stay together? How big must have its former owner have been for an Aeri to be able to wear it on top of his own flesh? Leaving D'ob was looking like a better idea every moment; this guy was interesting, albeit it in a super creepy way.
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Posted: Sun Nov 22, 2009 7:04 pm
All of a sudden there was movement in front of Dimitri, and it brought him out of his state of thinking. He brought his head up to look at this newcomer. She was very... pink. He had not been expecting to see anything so bright and colorful today, not in this whiteness, anyway. But quick to recover, Dimitri offered this Reya a faint smile and then bent his head to the side to look at her better with one eye while looking a little bashful.
"Well... I'm not much of a story-teller... and it is a rather long story... But if you really wanna know, miss, I could try to sum it up for you..." He stood there like that for a few moments, trying to gather the most important parts of his story, then stamped a hoof and cleared his throat. He cast his gaze down once more and began to speak, though if he was being coherent, he didn't know.
"There was an Aeri, like me, but the biggest I had ever seen. He towered over the rest of our herd. Not that he'd ever be allowed near anyone in the herd, though. No, no. He was mad, he was. I would see him following me about, ever since I was a colt, always a little way off, but always there." A slight shiver ran across the Aeri's coat, and he took this moment to look up and see if the Reya was still interested in his explanation. He knew it was a long one, but he was making it as short as he could, giving her just the basics... even if they did seem a little far-fetched, as even he was rather tall for an Aeri, and who would believe him that there were others even bigger? Well, he guessed that the bones along his back might help, but that didn't necessarily mean that she would still be interested.
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Posted: Tue Nov 24, 2009 4:49 am
Mia perked her ears up; a story hu? Well, she had the time, and she'd never seen anything like this before! Despite her best efforts, the pink mare had never been able to shake off her intellectuality nature. Much as she might just want to have fun and flirt, her brain insisted on being given nice puzzles and or new situations to think about.
"Go on," she encouraged as the Aeri trailed off, "what did he do? Did you ever find out why he was following you?" Sounded like something that could really mess a foal up, being stalked by a massive stallion that probably had sinister motives. Being messed up was certainly a good reason to run around with a heap of bones on your back, but maybe this dark creature wasn't loopy, maybe he had a real reason to wear them. It might be a strange one she guessed, but he didn't seem too mad to her right now, so perhaps the reason made sense to him at least.
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Posted: Tue Nov 24, 2009 12:26 pm
Her words helped him gather his thoughts into a more concise order, and so after taking a deep breath, the big green Aeri continued his story.
"I'd see him constantly, lurking here or stalking there, but no one ever believed me. I guess it could have been because his coat was dark as night and he used the shadows as his cover..." A spark of anger wove into his voice, "They all thought I was mad, that I was seeing things. Just trying to get attention, they thought. It was all their fault. If they had only listened, then perhaps he would have gone away. They didn't want me to stay. There was no room for a crazy Aeri in that herd, and so I ran away." His expression softened a bit, perhaps a touch of sadness was even present, but he quickly recovered once more and said, "I left them behind on my first day of adulthood and never looked back. But what I couldn't shake... was that strange black giant that continued to follow me everywhere I went."
At this point, he stood up a little straighter and shook out his mane, trying to get it out of his eyes. He closed his eyes for a moment and took a great big breath. When he opened them once more, his voice was soft and he looked into the mare's eyes when he spoke, "I've never told anyone this story before... You're the first to hear it, miss. Everyone I've met since then has just brushed me off as mad, or assumed a violent nature..." Dimitri was happy that someone was finally listening to him, even though he feared that by the end of his story she might just brush him off just as everyone else had.
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Posted: Thu Nov 26, 2009 5:10 am
"Well... You seem pretty calm and level-headed to me," Mia said with a grin after a slight pause. "Cute too!" In an odd creepy way, he had a bit of a dangerous look, which was exciting even if his temper didn't match his appearance. Besides, she'd always liked tall stallions, and mares come to that. "So you left your herd and he kept following you... Are those his bones then?"
What a wrench it must have been for the younger version of this yellow-eyed creature to flee his family and friends, fearing some dark shadow that they would not believe existed and after that only to find it was still stalking him... Why? What had made the dark giant pick him out? Were they connected in some way the boned stallion didn't know about, or had it been at random, perhaps fueled but the mysterious giant's apparent madness? To her it was a fascinating story and an interesting puzzle, but to her new acquaintance it must all be a whole lot less fun. Still, he seemed glad of her interest, so she didn't feel too bad about her curiosity. Perhaps he needed to talk about it all, maybe it was even easier to tell it all to a stranger, somebody he wasn't close to, somebody whose opinion one way or another didn't impact on him too much. If members of her own herd had thought she was lying or nuts about being stalked she supposed she might take comfort in talking it out to a stranger.
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Posted: Wed Dec 02, 2009 1:09 pm
He bowed his head a moment at the mare's kind words, maybe even a touch of red made it's way onto his cheeks, though if it was visible through his dark coat, he really hoped it wasn't. This mare seemed to have a curiosity similar to his own, and he was glad for that, for he knew that if anyone were to accept him for what he did, it would have to be someone with that want for knowledge, for stories and answers.
When she asked if the bones were the dark stallions, he responded with a nod and then, "Yes... these are his. It had been a long year, my first in adulthood, when this stallion was on my tail no matter how far and long I ran. Before long I got tired of running and decided that it had to end. I made my days a pattern, and learned his. Then one day I hid, and crept up on him. I was tired of running from him and was finally going to confront the Shadow. Oh... he didn't like that!" Dimitri was shaking his head, gaze having dropped back down to his hooves, which were now shuffling back and forth. "I.. I... didn't know what he was talking about... his voice was low and guttural... and he... he kept saying something about 'it all being my fault' and 'I was to be blamed' and 'I was the problem, the reason.' I still don't know what he was talking about... but eventually... I hope to figure that out." He tossed his mane once more, having found it's way back into his bright eyes. "The run changed from that point into a hunt. Now, he was not only chasing me, but was out to get me," He paused to swallow, "To kill me."
It had all changed because he decided to put his neck on the line and try to end the absurd chase. He had not imagined that the black stallion, whom he referred to as 'the Shadow', had been out to kill him all along. That moment, the confrontation, is what he figured had turned the entire scheme from a mulled over thought, to a crazy hunt to the death.
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Posted: Thu Dec 03, 2009 6:06 am
Mia shuddered at the description, and wondered what she might have done in his place. Fight? Maybe, if she thought the stallion was so crazy she could beat him... Or maybe he was so crazy that he was nigh on invincible. Running for it would probably be the sensible plan, but she’d never been all that good at sensible. “Well, I see you came out on top in the end,” she said eventually, “but stars that can’t have been a good time. Huge great crazy brute saying it wants you dead...” And so young, too, only just and adult. Seemed this guy - whose name she had just realized she didn’t know but oh well - had had quite a rough life all in all. She doubted her encounter with him would be able to change that much, but maybe talking about it all, or just talking to someone in general, would help him a little.
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Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2009 12:24 pm
It had been a horrible time in his life, yes, but it was the past now. That was the only reminder that kept him sane when he thought back about that year, his first year as an adult. Another breath, and he continued his story.
"That dark creature stalked me with more and more hunger in his eyes. I didn't know why he wanted me dead, but the fact was that if I couldn't outrun or outsmart this monster, he would have exactly what he wanted: me dead. And so our chase turned into a run for my life. He spent every day on his hunt, with barely the chance for me to rest or sleep. I grew skinny, hardly any time to stop and eat, barely enough food to get me by as it was, in those blasted mountains."
Anger rose into his voice once more, "I thought if I climbed up, into the mountains I used to play in as a foal, that perhaps he wouldn't be able to follow. But he did. That stupid brute followed me over the sharpest rocks and through the most dangerous canyons, and eventually it was the death of him," A sigh escaped the green Aeri and he deflated a little in the process, seeming a little bit shorter,
"It was a dark morning, mist all around, sky a dark grey as if it were angry with the world. I was sleeping in a cave, and he had managed to sneak up on me, to creep into the cave but his heavy breathing woke me up, and not a moment too soon. I just managed to lurch forwards, underneath the great beast before his hooves came thundering down on where my head had been moments before.
"I scrambled to my hooves and tore out from under him and ran out of the cave, just barely stopping myself from going over the edge of the ledge in front. The Shadow wasn't so lucky. He turned from stomping the empty ground, to follow me out of the cave, so angry he was that I had escaped once, that his eyes were barely open, demonic slits burning with hatred they were. His mane flew about wildly and his nostrils flared as he ran at me full speed, but what he didn't see, was the edge...
"He threw himself at me blindly, but I managed to roll out of the way, only just saving myself from death, while he tumbled off the edge and down the side of the rocky mountain. I didn't escape entirely, though. He had clipped my flank on the way down causing a limp in my step for the next few days..."
Dimitri stopped for a moment in his story to take some deep breaths. He could almost feel that excruciating pain in his flank now, as he spoke of it.
He had rambled on about what happened, and how the stallion had died. But there was still the details of how he had attained the bones he now wore upon his back. Dimitri was so caught up in telling his story, that he had almost forgotten that he was telling it to another Nequus, but for now he was mulling over how to explain the end of his life-or-death adventure.
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Posted: Wed Dec 09, 2009 3:15 pm
That did not sound like a fun time; he must have been really desperate to venture into the mountains, either set, and she didn't feel like pestering him to ask if he had been east, west, or more northerly. Talking about past issues was good up to a point, but then there was that point where you didn't want strangers prying any deeper. Probably there was anyway, she didn't have any really trumatic events in her past to go on but it seemed a fairly fair assumption.
"At least he's not stalking you now, hu?" she gave the massive stallion a slight smile. "Must have been a huge relief... So I guess you flew down to where he died eventually?" Had he stripped away the flesh himself, or waited for it to rot? Either way the idea made her shiver a little; death and decay had that effect or her, on most Nequus come to that. Maybe not this one though, if he didn't mind carrying bones around with him everywhere... But bones were better, far less distressing than putrifying flesh, morbid rather than grotesque.
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