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Drip Drip Drop Little April Showers Jensen
IP: 86.9.23.197
Posted on May 16, 2010 at 07:32:57 PM by Phoenix & Loki



P H O E N I X & L O K I





Have you ever woken up and not known where you were? Or have you woken up and known instantly where you are because you quite simply don’t want to be there? Or maybe you just wake up and decide sod it all I want to go back to sleep.... generally because part of you is lazy. In other cases people want to cling to their dreams and deny reality. After all what’s so great about reality? Reality is harsh, and tangible, it hurts it takes away the possibilities we so naively believe in as children. As a child you can be anything, want to grow or become anything. Your sheer imagination is at its best and the possibilities that reality robs us of in the end are still there. Face it as a child no one wanted to be ‘a doctor’ or a ‘secretary’ or a ‘business analyst’. As a child you can be anything want to be anything. Children in shaman are no different to those who come from elsewhere. Elsewhere a girl in her fourth year wants to be a wolf, and again even further away a pale boy with sandy coloured hair wants to be a time lord. They haven’t had reality forced into them yet, their minds are still open to anything and everything. Possibilities are endless except for those who only see the reality. Children grow up too quick now-a-days. That small amount of childhood freedom and innocence is often quickly squished, wiped away quicker than it should be. A child should be allowed to be a child; because lets face it reality sucks.

Reality sucks because it’s real, or because it’s real it sucks? Maybe if you close your eyes and dream you can escape the reality that’s been bred into you. Meet Phoenix she’s one of the unlucky sods who can’t escape reality even in her dreams. But that’s all because she doesn’t dream she has nightmares. Phoenix has frequent evil nightmares but no dreams. In fact I say they border on scare-mares. Scare-mares are nightmares that are so bad you’re literally having a panic attack in your sleep and you find it difficult to wake up. In nightmares it reaches a point where we become so terrified we wake ourselves up. Scare-mares that doesn’t happen the terror just continues. Generally only small children who’ve been through some traumatic event are plagued by them and as they get older they grow out of these night terrors. But in some cases they still manifest in teenagers and adults. Phoenix is in this category. She doesn’t remember if she dreamed before, if she had happy fluffy bunny kind of dreams. And once they took her all she knows is she rarely slept, sleeping was a luxury and dangerous to boot. So even now, now that they’re gone, now that she’s safe she still has nightmares; or scare-mares. She supposed they’d get better the longer she was away, the longer she was safe. The longer her emotions slipped into a content way even happy at times. That hadn’t been so she had her own kind of family now in the mountains. True it wasn’t like she had a lover or a soul mate there but she was honestly in one of the more pleasant moments of her life.

She had Jensen who was admittedly extremely private about his past but then so was she, probably Loki is the only one who knows what her past entails but even he knows to keep his mouth shut on that particular subject. Otherwise he’s a cocky loud mouthed twerp and yes Phoenix frequently tells him this... also that if he’s not careful she’ll let Kopa eat him. She never would, it’s a completely empty threat but that when the fox knows he’s pressed his luck a bit too much for even Phoenix to handle. Still even if he is quiet and reserved she still sees him as a brother, a brother she can unmercifully tease and a brother she never allows to make food. Seriously the first time he made tea...or was it coffee? She couldn’t tell but he’d made that and given it to her and she’d choked on the stuff her nose wrinkled and she swiftly put the mug down and asked oh so un-calmly if he’d been trying to poison her. He hadn’t... or so he said but either way she wasn’t excepting any form of food or hot drink from him again. And so far she hasn’t. As well as Jensen and Kopa she also has Morgana and Kraar who are perhaps the only other people she feels truly close to or should that be cares about? Morgana very much reminds Phoenix of who she used to be as a child but they differ as well and whilst she’s protective and sees Morgana as something close to a daughter she would never resent Morgana actual birth mother if she came for her. Okay strictly speaking that’s not entirely true, she’d quite likely yell and question and wait for some form of decent explanation but if there was one then she’d understand. Perhaps that helps you understand how she feels about the girl, Kraar on the other hand is a different matter Phoenix has no way of knowing what the bird thinks she just knows that he loves and would give anything to protect Morgana and that’s enough for her. Loki on the other hand would maul anyone who tried to hurt the girl, but he didn’t particularly like Kraar; to be blunt he wanted to play with him, especially his head. Phoenix and Loki have their differences. She doesn’t always say what she’s internalising, and can be on occasion more tactful. Loki lacks any sense of tact and quite bluntly will say whatever he wants and often chooses to say whatever phoenix is thinking when she won’t; a trait she finds most annoying.

However lately she hasn’t really had the problem of yelling at Loki to shut the hell up as he’s been.... not quiet but not exactly speaking a language she understands. She can’t speak fox or wolf, or canine or any other animal language for that matter. Admittedly the bandits who took her pretty much left her on a leash with their mongrel dogs as a child and thus she has a particular wild streak within her but she didn’t exactly learn their language. Why is Loki not speaking in human tones? Well if you live in Shaman you should know the reason why. The reason Loki isn’t talking is rats. Yes that’s completely unhelpful if you’re an alien and have never set foot in Shaman. If you’re a shamanite you’ll understand. Rats cause curses, well not all rats admittedly there are seven of these particular curse issuing ones. Basically evil deity trapped behind particular powerful barriers is using rats to break free. The rats are imbued with magic and when they break free boom new curse. Phoenix doesn’t particularly like rats. Probably because that’s one of the food groups she got to digest as a child; rat meat. It was that or scraps. The dogs used to kill rats she used to eat them. They don’t taste that great. But raw meat doesn’t. She used to throw it back up a lot of the time but sometimes at least some of it would stay own. Either way rat is not the greatest meal neither is scraps and scavenged bits of mould encrusted bread. That’s why she learnt to cook as soon as she could and also why Jensen gets shooed away whilst she’s cooking. Anyways rat number one had caused the clouds of ash that blocked out the sun and made her mountain home colder than ever. Loki at that point hadn’t really minded being an arctic fox he was pretty much in his element. Phoenix on the other hand made a strong point of staying in doors by a fire. Cold climates she could deal with completely freezing, frostbiting climates she couldn’t deal with at all thus every fire within the colony of homes in vista mountain was stocked particularly high...even more so if she was in that room. The volcano hadn’t even convinced her more artistic side to come out and suffer the freezing climes to draw the scene, something she usually would have done.

Still the first curse continued and after a while she started to venture out, just not for overly long, during the first curse Loki had still been talking and functioning as a regular familiar and he’d been able to tell her when she was getting to cold and that she should turn back. So her usual wandering of the mountain tended to be cut shorter than usual. Then the second curse had struck as rat number two embraced the world of shaman. See the first clue Phoenix had got that there was something wrong was when Jensen came pelting out of the snow and ash towards the homes. The first curse had been much more noticeable, a volcano blowing its top is sort of hard to miss...unless your dead or buried or some such. Jensen running like a maniac with Kopa following at a steadily increasing speed was nothing new. In fact her first assumption had been that the lion was trying to be a scarf again. It was all Loki’s fault of course. The white fox had a habit of acting as a scarf for Phoenix, a particularly white fluffy one. And after Kopa had seen him do that to phoenix he in his wisdom decided it would be a good idea to try the same thing with Jensen. Jensen had or course yelled no several times whilst backing up only to have a particularly large white lion jump and knock him straight to the floor in a heap. Loki had snickered for days and phoenix had admittedly collapsed in fits of laughter especially at Kopa’s confused face and Jensen’s completely un-amused expression. Even now Kopa had a habit of flying tackles which were his form of hugging thus Jensen running from a potential knock out hug was nothing unusual. Until she noticed, it had taken longer than would be normal for most shamanites to notice if they’d had her gift. But Loki hadn’t been with Phoenix all that long so she didn’t notice the broken telepathic connection at first, what she noticed was the fact there were no silver like cords connecting Kopa and Jensen. That was not right and seeing as she could still see the green glow around the male faerie she knew her power hadn’t suddenly gone dormant. For those few moments she’d been stood on the threshold of her home with an expression of sheer confusion. She barely registered as Jensen grabbed her arm and promptly threw both of them into her house whilst leaning on the door as a loud bang noise sounded as the white lion hit the door. Jensen had kept his whole weight on the door whilst Phoenix’s mind snapped back into place; especially as all of a sudden she was aware of a sharp severe pain in her foot and a yell had shot out of her throat as she looked down to discover Loki. Just like Kopa there were no longer any silver cords of light connecting them, no he was just a white ash stained arctic fox whose sharp little teeth were buried into the flesh and bone of her foot. The pain had caused her shriek and seconds later she’d flailed and the fox had hit the wall. Promptly she’d grabbed him whilst he was stunned and shaking his head and shoved him into her wardrobe. There he remained clawing at the doors with little success as she’d locked them and kept the key with her.

Now you understand why she and Loki aren’t talking at the moment since he’s a feral, rabid hungry fox locked in her wardrobe. Kopa had eventually given up trying to break the door down to eat them and apparently left to find some other source of food, she hoped not other faeries even though it was of course a possibility. She missed her loud mother twerp of an arctic fox and his constant scrabbling from inside the wardrobe twisted her insides with guilt. Thus she’d resorted to taking raw meat and opening the door or the wardrobe a smidgen throwing the meat inside before quickly slamming the door shut and locking it, in hopes that at least he wouldn’t starve to death before the curse wore off, if it wore off. She was a realist in the sense that there was a possibility that the curse would never wear of and she’d never have her Loki back again. It was a depressing thought but one that could become a reality. You had to consider the outcomes even if they were bad, they were possible. In fact if they were bad they seemed even more likely to occur at least in phoenix’s experiences that had been the case. She knew Jensen missed the white fluff ball of a lion even if he didn’t say it or admit it out loud it was apparent to her, maybe she was just become more skilled at reading his stoic expressions. She knew for Morgana it must be even worse as she relied so much on Kraar and now the bird was a stranger in so many ways. Still the raven haired girl had been able to talk with the birds at least as that was one of her powers. So she could still communicate with her familiar even if it hurt her that he didn’t know that was what he was.

Reality as it was these days was really starting to suck.... a lot. Her days had settled into a steady cycle of having silent scare-mares and waking up covered in cold sweat and shivering, scared and alone. After which always followed showering and clothes. Clothes which had depleted seeing as her wardrobe was un-open-able thanks to the fox that has residence there, she was lucky in the fact she kept some of her clothes in drawers as well. After which she’d chase Jensen out of the kitchen and make herself coffee (rather than drink the tar he created) and possibly eat something, before the fun of tossing meat inside her wardrobe without letting the hungry fox out. Originally that process had swallowed up her whole mornings but she’d gotten steadily quicker and more skilled at throwing the fox meat without letting him escape. Normally she filled her days with wandering the mountains or the cove. But the fact a huge amount of ash and volcanic matter now covered pretty much everywhere as well as the fact Loki was locked in her wardrobe meant she stayed close to the mountains or to be more precise her home in the mountains. This day was no different to any of the other at least to begin with.

As usual she’d not been able to escape reality and had been stuck in world of nightmares. She’d gone to bed late as she always did; she hated sleeping because she knew they’d haunt her again. Recently the deep purple shadows beneath her eyes had become steadily more apparent and darker. She didn’t like them but she’d rather have them than suffer her nightmares for longer. Her body had tossed and turned all night as she unconsciously fought the demons that terrorised her sleep and woke with a bump as she rolled off the bed and onto the floor banging her head against the wood. Her jaw muscles had been clenched tight whilst she slept, she always refused to scream, it was something that had become inbuilt and by now she just accepted it. With a throbbing head and sheets tangled around her she’d cursed and struggled to free her sweat drenched body of the sheets. Shivering in the overly large shirt she slept in her bare feet, (one still bandaged thanks to the fox bite) limped there way across to her bathroom. Seating her self on the side of the bath she slowly unravelled the bandage and winced as she removed the dressing that was marked with a dark crust of dried blood. She hissed as she leaned her weight back onto her injured foot as she moved into the shower and let the cold sweat of her nightmares be washed away by warm water. Her hair stuck to the back of her neck as she stood still letting the drops pelt her face. Twisting the tap off; the water that had gathered round her ankles and was infused with blood swirled away down the drain. Drying off she carefully placed a clean sterilised dressing on the fox bite and bandaged up her foot. Limping across to her drawers she sighed as she tried to find something warm to wear eventually she managed to settle and sitting on the edge of her bed pulled on a set of thick black tights and atop of those leggings. Next she pulled over her head a blue vest and then a long sleeved white shirt. Atop of these she threw on a deep purple tunic style dress it was sleeveless and came down to her mid-thighs. She refused to freeze. If had been anyone else but Phoenix they’d have put boots on as well. But this is phoenix and she refuses all shoes, the tights were a stretch for her but warmth had been important.

Hobbling out of her room she’d made her way down one of the long wooden corridors in the slight light the torches cast and entered the large communal kitchen. Her hair was still damp even though she’d towelled it and she tied back loosely as she set about making herself a pot of coffee. Pouring the dark brown liquid into a mug she added two teaspoons of sugar to chase of the bitterness and swallowed down the sweet nectar that gave her body a quick jolt of caffeine to wake her up. She glances towards the window and note that it’s still dark outside but that’s not all that surprising for her at least. She always wakes up early and it’s always before the dawn of the sun. That’s why when she finished off drinking the last few mouthfuls of coffee the first sign of light was beginning to enter the mountains. Pulling out a plate of raw meat her nose wrinkled at the bloody mess but none the less she padded back to her home and as quickly and carefully as she could threw the meat inside the wardrobe and slammed it shut.

Picking up her sword and the sketchbook she walks outside onto the wooden decking that’s raised off the ground. For an hour she practises the moves, she’s learnt from their selection of books in the community living area, with the sword she’s never going to win swordswoman of the year but she’s learning. By the time the hours up her arms ache and she’s panting. Sitting down she rests her back on the exterior wall of her home and gazes out around her. All ready the ash and snow are evident and as the grey light of day begins to dawn through the pitch black of the night she reaches for the book beside her and with a piece of charcoal she sketches the surrounding scenery that’s submerged in a layer of snow and ash. It’s as she sketches that she begins to notice that something isn’t right. At first she can’t place it, the last verges of sleep clinging like cobwebs to her mind not allowing her to register what it is that’s different. It’s as she hears the noises from inside the other homes meaning others are perhaps starting to wake that the dust is finally shaken from her mind and it dawns on her. It’s a puzzlement really not something you’d notice at first. The animals; not familiars but animals in general, there are more, far more than usual and they didn’t seem scared of spooked by her presence or the houses. In fact they seemed more scared of what it was they were running from. Their goal simply seemed to be to reach higher land. It confuses her and dropping the sketchbook, the charcoal rolling away she moves as quickly as she can down the steps and further way from their home to lower ground. It’s as she enters the passage of their land which leads down the mountain and out that she comes across it...water. Water a lot of it and steadily rising. For a moment she stays very still her first thought dawning that it would make an excellent image to sketch before she the danger spikes and adrenaline begins to course through her veins. Turning she ignores the ache and pain in her foot and sprints through the ash and snow back to the houses yelling as she goes. Leaping the steps two at a time she runs through the corridors yelling banging on the doors as she goes. By the time she reaches the communal living room the numbness the snow had inflicted into her foot had worn off and all she felt was sheer agony in her foot as she came to a stop seeing Jensen standing there with a mug of coffee. Her hair now damp with sweat as well as her previous shower was pushed out of her eyes with one of her hands. Harsh panting escaped her lips and instead of screaming she spoke very slowly and calmly. “Shamans flooding, the waters already up to the passage’ it’ll be here soon. We need to leave now!”

The last word was heavily stressed with one hell of a lot of emphasis behind it. Grabbing his arm she pulled him up the stairs. She didn’t know if he’d believed her but she wasn’t about to wait for the water to flood their home and get his toes wet before he realised she was being honest. Flinging open the door her mouth went dry as water was already beginning to seep into their home. The floor was covered in a thin layer of water which she marched through her hold on Jensen loosening. She assumed that she didn’t need to drag him now that the threat was obvious. It was strange how the threat of flooding affected her. She was scared of course; she’d have to be stupid not to be. But it made her prioritise her thoughts perfectly, instead of loosing her head as some do in these situations it made her go completely calm, rational. Asides from alerting the others in vista she’d found Jensen which was one of the main things. She knew Morgana was elsewhere and that the flock of birds which had accumulated around her would have helped her to escape the danger. Also the fact she could do nothing to help the girl where she was, was clear in her mind. Her priorities therefore had to be in making sure that she and Jensen and Loki got out of this alive. Kopa was a wild animal he like the others would head for high ground. The other inhabitants of Vista she’s all ready alerted and besides everyone who lived here were pretty good at looking after themselves. Sure there was Joanna’s baby but Joey would look after her.

Splashing through the slowly rising water with some effort she managed to pull her door open. She wasn’t about to let the fox out of the wardrobe but she wasn’t about to loose it either. Her eyes searched for Jensen, “Help me with this, I can’t leave Loki and I can’t let him out. We don’t have rafts but this will float,” she didn’t waste anymore of her breath and struggling with the wardrobe it eventually hit the floor with a crash and splash. Yanking the front door of her home open there was a sudden influx of water and she clung to the door so she wasn’t swept away with it.

“We need to get that thing outside” she yelled and with the mans help they pulled the wooden wardrobe out into the deeper water; she gasped as the coldness hit her knees and sloshed upwards. The wardrobe bobbed atop the water and the sounds of scrabbling were still heard within. Pulling herself onto the wardrobe she thanked whatever entity was out there for nudging her in the direction of asking Jensen for a particularly large wardrobe. She knew it wasn’t over yet though she reached out a hand to help the man clamber atop the wooden object that could hopefully save their lives. She had no idea what they were going to use for paddles as the sword that remained clipped to her belt wouldn’t be much use, they’d find something even if it was just debris from the houses. Fighting to catch her breath she dug her fingertips into the wood hoping she wouldn’t fall off this thing, as well as hoping that she wasn’t going to get seasick. “So I guess this is the third curse”








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