OOC:
@Lion
The night sky danced with fireflies beneath the canopy of thick jungle trees. Broad leaves created layers of broad, deep shadows. But a part in the trees allowed for some of the moonlight to shine down, sparkling the pool of waters that stretched out before her in the rock bed, fed by the Tun-tun Falls. But it was not the dancing bugs, or the glow of the moon, or even the insects night chatter that drew her attention.
It was what was in the water, as the reflection she saw was anything but the beast she had known to be. She was a fierce beast! Strong and agile, conquering of the Tungatta Territory at the base of Mount Moon. She had the strength and the power in her voice, but now...
She must have shifted. It happened from time to time. And she always got mad. She felt so lame in this form, so much more muted from the jungle around her.
She even sensed some hostility from her mother Gri-gri when she was like this. But what could she do?
Staring hard at the emerald eyes of the dark skinned woman she had now changed into, she moved to dig her fingers into the iron rusted lake shore and began to paint on her stripes. She might not look wholly like her true tiger self, but she would try her damnedest to please her mother before she'd awaken. But just as she was drawing the final stripes down the curves of her cheek, a sudden explosion made her leap away from the lake shore and slip back against the tall ferns.
Soon a plume of smoke and strange smells filled her senses. And she could see it was coming from
her side of Mount Moon. Slipping into the dark jungle underbelly, she began to make her way forward, not sure what she'd find when she got ot the strange scent and smoke-
But she couldn't just let some strange thing into
her home. For here was tiger territory, and she'd be damned if she let anyone else come in to claim it.
It'd been a long hard road, and Christer never thought he'd be this far away from home. Not that he'd had a choice. Getting captured and sold as a slave wasn't exactly his idea of continental travel, but as it were things happened when one least expected them to. He'd gotten drunk, or something or other, or maybe he'd gotten hit on the head. Either way he was shit out of luck and stuck in bondage.
Christer hated this wagon, filled with other sticky smelly bodies that clearly indicated the rotting of flesh on one of the slaves in the same boat as he was. He was one of the strongest of the passel of bodies here, and among the youngest that made his prospective buyers look at him with agreement before he was whipped and shoved off to join his new owners in a dig deep within the jungle.
The air smell of hot fart, it was dreadful and Christer was certain he'd never been more miserable in his whole life. God, was Ansgar out to get him or something? Was something just wrong with him that he brought all this misfortune on himself.
When he arrived at the dig site, a massive hole had all ready been blown into the ground, and there was a burning residue that smelled distinctly of flesh. "Dig," he was told, and handed a shovel between his shackled hands and he was thrown halfway into the dirt.
Just what he was digging for, he didn't know.
She wished she could move faster. Becoming a tiger would make this all the more easier. But the strange smell was getting stronger the closer she ventured, but as she crested a hill...
There was the scent of something else.
She sniffed at her arm, then at the air, then at her arm again. Furrowing her brows, she took a few long, slow strides before approaching a thick wall of ferns. Her nose twitched. There was definitely something..... unusually familiar mingled in with the smoke. And as she parted the ferns to see, she found herself dumb struck as she peered over at the form of some un-tiger creature who looked to have a similar, silly type animal structure as she!
Christer and a few others were directed into the pit, some tripping and falling down, landing with a nasty crack. He lingered back, and watched them before he was pushed to follow them. The air was acrid and he was sweating something awful through his shirt. He couldn't remember the last time he had a change of clothes, forget that, he couldn't remember when he last had a bath.
"This is beneath me," he said with a groan as he went about digging. "I'm a knight for God's sake."
"And I'm the Queen of Adela," a squeaky slave laughed. Christer scowled at him, face burning from more than just the heat.
He looked up to the bushes, heard rustling and he frowned. Perhaps it was just best to mind his own business.
Another blast sent the slaves to the dirt, and the masters howling. They were barking back and forth, wondering,
"Just who in the hell used the black powder! Ay-ley! We are to use it sparringly!"
Turns out it had been an accident, and it left the masters a scowling mess.
It also scared the piss out of Giya, who, for the moment, retreated far enough away from the noise, and the tremendous smells.
In the disarray Christer had managed to scramble some distance into the brush, as the masters brought the remaining slaves back to the dig. Christer realized then that he had to pee, very much so, and he wandered a little further into the brush.
Alleviating himself then, he looked back, wondering if they would even notice he was gone. The shackles obviously didn't seem very convenient, but it would be pretty stupid to go back. So he wandered up a little further up the hill, holding onto the shovel until he heard the wild growl of a leopard behind him.
He turned round... "Nice kitty."
Hearing another funny noise, Giya found herself crawling slowly forward on her belly to get a better look at what was going on. As she neared it, she saw some strange yellow arch of water. She sniffed the air and made a face. Was that urine?
Noting to whom the urine was attached to,s he couldn't help but watch it all, from pee, to cock, to man. Looking down between her legs, she knew she had no bits like that! Curiouser, she continued to stalk closer until she noticed another scent too late-
It was Leshesha, and she was pissed.
She had never been fond of leopards, pissy hunters who were too easy to turn tail and run when her mother roared. But Gri-gri wasn't here- and she was just in this pathetic, hairless form! Even still, this was her first time ever seeing someone so hairless like she! So when Leshesha bared her teeth, Giya wasted no time in taking action, leaping out of the underbrush and tackling the much larger beast into the thick brush on Christer's other side.
The sound that emerged from Christer didn't come from him. It couldn't have, it was much higher pitched and sounded like a bird. Christer fell back when something came out from the corner of his eye and saw the leopard crashing off into the brush. He didn't know what else he could do. Did he really want to stick around and see who won?
Then again, running might get the attention of who he was trying to get away from.
He snatched the shovel, holding it spade forward and moved it around, trying to get a whack at the leopard.
[Is Giya in human form or tiger form?]
It would be hard to see what was going on, as growls and roars and screams could be heard from the thick, wrestling in the underbrush. But there was a suddenly tail and leg that peered out, one the man had happened to get a lucky strike on and with a howl, the leopard leaped out of the brush and clawed at the man-
Only to have itself tackled off of him a moment later and pinned into the ground, a naked woman, dark skina nd wild hair, with only rusty mud smeared across her body to camouflage her nakedness.
The claws of the leopard made contact with his inner thigh, and Christer yelped. Another parroty sound. But his fear was overcome with adrenaline and when he saw the naked woman come out in a blur of brown, he gasped, and paused only a moment before he rolled up onto his feet and darted for the trees.
Giya hissed in Leshasha's face, but the moment the leopard was able to retaliate, she easily threw Giya off her back as the woman hit off a nearby tree with a sinking crunch. The leopard let the woman to rot, nostril's flaring as it took off after the man- her initial prey.
Christer only had so much meat on him, however he was not going to leave it to chance that the leopard might leave him be because of it. He heard the paws behind him and he suddenly stopped, the leopard leaping up into the air and he sliced the shovel across its underbelly when he ducked beneath her.
Not expecting the slash, Leshesha stumbled to a landing and growled out in pain, about faced and was charging Christer again.
Christer barely turned around before the leopard was on him again. With a shove, he planted the wood shaft of the shovel between her teeth and fought to wrench her off him.
But Leshesha's teeth were sharp, and her jaw, strong, and the wooden handle of the shovel bowed and splintered beneath her jaws, threatening to break.
Christer twisted the shovel turning it over in his hand and knocking the leopard off to the side. He didn't wait for another lunge, instead moving forward and jamming to sharpened tip into her side.
Leshesha let out a howl, and her chomping teeth snapped once at Christer before she felt the sharp end pressing in deep within her body. Hot blood began to spill, but even then, the beast tried again, furious it was injured, furious the tides had turned-
And then there was another roar- that strange, sickly roar that damn tiger-thing made and suddenly Christer was being shoved aside, and the wild woman took over the shovel, and continued to strike at Leshesha until the beast howled no more, and settled onto the ground in a useless heap of her own blood, leaving Giya standing over her, breathing heavily, and holding the shovel like some awkward javelin.
When Christer was thrown aside, the blow was strong enough to make him dizzy. He was only partlu conscious when the leopard had at last been killed. He saw the dark shape of a woman, or something like it. And the pain and sting from the long slashes on his thigh had been leaking more blood than he realized.
Head lolled back, and his vision went dark.
When he'd awaken again, she hoped it'd be when she was tossing the cold waters of the Makka-Makka river at his face. They were icy cold, and his body had been sticky, hot. But then again, so was her own body. She didn't know what to do with him, having had to check to see if the strange beast like her were alive.
But she didn't have a chance to fully check him the way she wanted to, so after dragging him to the river, she paused a moment to look him over, and her hands moved to feel over his face, his nose his cheeks... and she did the same thing to herself.
A beast like her. She turned back to the river, and continued to splash him with larger amounts of water, growing impatient. He'd better be alive! Leshesha's mate would be fuming..
and if she killed her for this dead heap of a beast that looked like her.....
She wasn't sure what she'd do.
"No, no, I don't think I peed my pants," he murmured. He was woozy, and the cold water did something to cool him off. He gasped and his eyelids slowly opened, chest heaving to suck in some air. His head pounded something awful, however he was more surprised by the woman standing over him.
His body jerked, rekindling the pain in his leg. "Ouch!" he winced. Even that was short lived however. "You... you're naked..." And he looked down at himself. "I just have one question. Did I...um piss myself?"
Giya recoiled, if only a little, but her expression lit up upon seeing him awaken. Her eyes went wide, peering into his face. Yes! He had eyes like her's... she leaned forward, examining his mouth as he spoke, but needed to get closer and was soon crawling over top of him and forcing his lips open to look at his teeth. And teeth like her non-tiger ones too!
Her eyes grew curiously wide as she moved down, grabbing one of his arms and holding it up, prodding down his muscles, his joints then yanked his hand real close to her face, and moved to lift her own hand up before placing their hands together, palm to palm.
She tilted her head curiously.
They had the same limb types, the same fingers, claws...
Dropping his hand and turned around and leaned down, prodding his belly and poking at his chest, then looking at her own chest, then back to him as she made a face. That was definitely different. She looked down between her leg, and moved to remove what clothing was covering what was between his leg-
For if her hunch was correct...
They were the same sort of beast... and he must be... a male! Did a male mean a mate? Could he turn into a tiger too? Could he explain to her what this type of beast form was? Her hands worked like paws, trying ot claw his clothing clean off of him.
"What are you?!" He was cut off the moment she began her examination. And at tha moment, he was being poked and prodded, he suddenlh felt very vulnerable. Even moreso than usual.
"Hey! Stop! I'm fine!" Except he was still woozy from the blood loss, and he fought to push her hands away. "You can stop now. No need to pry off my clothes. Hey! Get out of there, you barbarian," he hissef and shuffled away, pushing her back with as much strength as he could muster.
At his shove, she instantly grew angry, and gave him an angry shove back, before stomping forward on her hands, forcing him down and she, moving over top of him and pinned him down roughly by his shoulders. Whatever it was he was saying, she didn't understand, but she could tell by his mannerisms he wasn't happy.
Well neither was she, and she growled right in his face.
At the show of her teeth, he gasped and his eyes widened considerably. What the hell was wrong with this woman? Was she just crazy? He turned his head away, trying to avoid the swell of her breath that came pouring into his face.
"Damn, look just get off me, please. I'm bleeding and you're very heavy!" he said and sneezed into her face.
She hissed at his sneeze, a most unexpected action, before she clawed his face with a hand, not unlike that of a cat,before shrinking off him with a hiss.
At her slinking back, Christer immediately panicked and with what strength he could, he lunged forward and reached for her wrist ignoring the pain in his face. "Please, don't go! Can you-can you do anything for my leg? Please, it really fucking hurts!"
Giya let out a cry,a nd swiped at his face again, but the man was stronger than he looked and that set Giya to roar- or at least as well as a woman, who wanted to be a tiger, could roar. She needed to show this male his place,a nd he'd find himself on his back again, her face in his as she growled. Had she a tail, it would be swishing.
Christer had no choice but to surrender his grip when this strange wild woman was on him again. Fear gripped him, and he tilted his head, away from her face and he held his breath. Mostly to keep from breathing hers in.
"Okay. I'm sorry! But please," he murmured. "I need help. Don't leave me like this. I'll do anything."