Post by Vio on Feb 25, 2015 14:21:26 GMT -5
One moon's life had passed by as the Shining Pirates, a fledgling but already formidable group in the North Blue, had sailed the seas towards their next destination. Finally, thanks to the navigation prowess of a certain penguin, they had set foot upon Shivre Mountain; a colder island for certain, but nothing they could not handle. The point was, Leonard le Clerc was back to his usual self, having mostly - if not entirely - recovered from the injuries he had sustained all those weeks ago. For that, the Captain had to thank Hiroto, the crew's doctor. Now, however, the crew were splitting up temporarily. Leonard and Hiroto had, through the peculiar barks of human speech, decided to travel into the island proper in search of supplies. As for Kusatta and Hikaru? Well, the shipwright was planning to make some much needed modifications to the vessel upon which they traveled, requiring the assistance of the chef. Brandon, too, now found himself having to wait aboard the ship for reasons unknown. Honestly, he understood next to nothing about this whole business. But, then again, humans could not hunt fish without using nets, or even sticks upon which they dangled worms. Strange, but clever. Typical of them.
Karu? Perfectly still he remained, as the man who smelled of smoke had asked of him, head raised proudly after an extensive preening session that had taken up the same time as the conversation before. Leonard and Hiroto had left just a few minutes beforehand, wearing thicker removable hides than before to resist the chilling climes of this strange new land. For Brandon, however, the bitter cold was welcoming. Nowhere near as cold as Viktas, whose icy claws he would never forget, but the kind of cold that was comfortable for a creature whose life was spent in wintry lands. Still, it intrigued him as to what Hikaru was doing, sitting there with a peculiar stick and that odd material humans called 'paper'. The only thing he knew about paper was that his own body now held similar qualities to it. That was it. But the penguin himself was most confused by the use of a stick upon it. A pointed stick, nonetheless. Was he poking holes in it? But, why did the human need him to stay still for that? Some sort of ritual? People seemed to love those things, despite the sheer lack of practicality. Wasting food and other useful things seemed to happen a lot with humans.
Oru... Finally, after a few tedious minutes of having to resist the urge to preen a loose bit of plumage beneath his flipper, Brandon was able to move again by permission of the shipwright. A single sigh escaped his beak, the awkward avian quickly taking up the chance to smooth out that offending feather as Hikaru headed off to work on... whatever it was he was working on. He had no idea, caring little about what everyone else was doing. Feathers were a more pressing matter! But, once he had finished with that, what else? Kusatta was busy learning the human tongue, albeit in a different way. He spoke it just fine but, unlike the others, the smelly grey-haired cook did not share the ability to understand the symbols of communication which they also used. It seemed stupid that the hairless apes would find a way to talk with one another that was so difficult, even they struggled to learn it.
Kuoh? There was nothing else to do, really, apart from regain his bearings. The open Blue was one thing, where a clever penguin such as himself could simply use the sun, the moon, the stars and the winds and tides to find where to go. But land was different. At least, a little bit. The way the Blue moved was different here, forced to conform to the shapes of the earth, which made the use of currents for navigation trickier. Even the winds differed when land was involved, but this place was familiar, even if it wasn't. Familiar in the sense that the towering mountain reminded the feathered fellow of home, of the huge hill that pierced the clouds, though this particular monster shared few characteristics with that of the one on Viktas. Still, Mister Penguin had always associated such things with danger, rocks and ice falling from the flanks of these looming shadows and crushing the unsuspecting who wandered at its feet. To be honest, he was a little worried, for Leonard and Hiroto's sakes.
"Oreo. Hiro," he chirped quietly, black beady eyes looking up towards the mountain and the strange scents that blew towards his nostrils from it as the winds cascaded down. A veritable assortment of scents, none too pungent, but enough to cloud his ability to pick out the particular ones. He was not like those strange-looking wolves that humans sometimes took with them, whose noses were so delicate that they could pick up a subtle scent from miles away many hours after the creator had left. No. Brandon's nose was far less sensitive, but still more efficient that a human's. Those poor creatures relied almost solely on sight and sound to determine friend and foe, despite each and every one of them having such a particular scent. Hikaru always smelled of smoke. Kusatta always had a dirtier scent. Leonard's odour was usually one of perspiration. Hiroto's was cleaner, but with the typical scent of female humans; one which males never seemed to pick up upon. They relied too much upon appearance to find a mate, it semed, though none showed much interest in taking the stripey-legged female - who, to his surprise, did not have stripy legs today - as their own. Did humans have a breeding season? Were these particular people not yet old enough to breed? Did humans even breed!? On that last thought, the penguin very nearly put a flipper to his face. Of course humans breed, Brandon, it's not like human young are delivered by storks!
"Ruuuuuuu~" A long yawn escaped his mouth as Brandon stretched his back. Then, with an air of curiosity, he waddled over to where Kusatta was, peering at the peculiar folding object from which he read. Interesting. Very interesting. A thought crossed his mind as he stared at the object, certain that the chef was not aware of his presence, for he seemed very much focused on his idle grumblings. Well, it was worth a shot, an opportunity to experiment with his own progressing powers. Body flattening, the peculiar penguin began to expand outwards, carefully folding pieces of his body over and over one another. His form got smaller and smaller, flatter and flatter. Eventually, after stopping to preen the same loose feathers from before, he had taken on the form of a small object. A black book. Though, he had no idea what to do now, having folded his own body over his face...Grading Note: Hikaru was absent at this time, so I took to a small amount of "godmodding" simply to secure the plot. That way, if he returns, he's solidly involved in the plot itself.