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 Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2006 10:32 pm
Tak stole quietly back onto the cliffs under the cloak of evening, flapping her wings once to steady herself as she silently made her way inside.
She had done something she was not proud of. But had deemed necessary all the same. In her shirt was a noticeably-large breathing lump whom she had "liberated" from the meadow not long ago as soon as the denmother had wandered far enough away from her post.
Unlike Pri, this one had not struggled...it had merely slept, making her task much easier. And from the look of it, no one was awake to greet her, either. This had gone flawlessly.
A smile curved her lips.
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Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2006 10:34 pm
"Hey Tak!" Denis greeted with a smile as he trotted up to her, tail swishing. "There ya are! I'm glad you're back, I was starting to get worried! Whatcha got in the--"
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Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2006 10:35 pm
If it were even possible, Tak managed to make her face into a fist at the peacock-colored male's loud speaking tone as she rounded on him angrily. "SHH!!" she hissed. "Be quiet! Someone will hear!"
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Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2006 10:36 pm
Denis drew up short, blinking owlishly at her. He expected being yelled at by Zim, but this was the first time Tak had raised her voice to him. "Um...okay..." he muttered, lowering his voice to a stage whisper. "Howcome we're being quiet? What's that?" he asked, nodding his head toward the bulge in her shirt.
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Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2006 10:38 pm
Tak gave him a long calculating look as though deciding whether she could truly trust him or not before reluctantly wrestling the large bundle out of her shirt for him to see.
"You will tell NO ONE, do you understand?" she asked, flattening her ears at him. "Zim is not to find out at any cost, I need your WORD, Denis..."
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Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2006 10:40 pm
The tiny red chick remained asleep for a moment and then chuffed once and began to nuzzle against Tak's shirt, paws and anything else her curious little muzzle could reach, making soft infant grunts all the while.
These were new smells....where had mama gone?
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Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2006 10:45 pm
Denis blinked at the chick in surprise and drew back a bit. Hadn't Tak gone on about what a moron Zim was for stealing Pri from his flock as a newborn? And now she'd gone and done the same thing...? Girls were weird.
"Right. No telling Zim." he agreed, venturing forward hesitantly to smell the new baby. "....where'd it come from?"
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Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2006 10:47 pm
"*I* saved her life." Tak told him with an arrogant toss of her head. "The little slimewad was abandoned in the grazing field and I brought her back with me." She supposed it wasn't an outright lie if you could consider the denmother wandering twenty feet away to be "abandoning".
"As such, she'll grow up to make a fine minion of this flock, don't you agree?"
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Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2006 10:48 pm
"Uh...yeah. Sure. I guess." Denis nodded uncertainly. It sort of made sense, he supposed. If someone had saved his life, he'd want to stay close to them too, but he had never heard of a chick just being abandoned like that. Must've been a really REALLY bad mother...
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Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2006 10:51 pm
"Good. Because I'll need your help." Tak stated, shoving the chick at Denis. "Take her somewhere safe and make sure she's fed. I don't have the time right now and if Zim finds me missing, I'll never hear the end of it. You'll do that for me, won't you? Thank you, Denis. You're a true soldier of the elite."
Without giving him a chance to reply, she had scuttled out of sight down one of the darkened passages.
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Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2006 10:53 pm
"Hey wait! I--" but it was too late. Tak was gone. Denis screwed up his face in distaste and peered down at the little red chick that had been dumped on him. Oh GREAT....
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Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2006 10:54 pm
She snuffled up in his direction and would be looking straight at him if not for the fact her eyes were still glued shut in her infancy. Giving a feeble squeal, she tried to make sense of the barrage of newness around her. This wasn't mama, she wanted mama!
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Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2006 10:56 pm
"Hey Denis...?" Pri asked softly from the shadows, edging forward and clearly having just woken up. "Denis, I heard some noise, is everything okay?" His eyes fell on the squirming little red bundle and he cocked his head curiously at it.
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Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2006 10:59 pm
"Yeah. Yeah, Squirt, everything's fine." Denis sighed, looking from the red baby to Pri. "Hey, you wanna do me a favor? Keep an eye on this...thing, all right? Make sure she eats and all. I've got stuff I need to do." He debated wandering off like Tak did before Pri could protest, but he wanted to make sure the younger gryph was going to agree first before he did. The last thing he needed was Tak jumping down his throat the next day because the little red one crawled itself over the mountainside or something...
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Posted: Thu Jul 20, 2006 11:00 pm
Pri's ears perked at the fact he was being entrusted with something as he trotted forward to snuffle at the little hatchling. "Okay, I think I can do that..." he readily agreed. How hard could feeding babies be, after all? "Where'd it come from?
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