From being an Abandoned who had rarely left the Hollowed Grounds, to embracing the call of adventure, to dying and being reborn first as an Ascended and then as an Ancient, Maea has gone through quite the amount of changes in her life. One thing remains common, though, in her attempts to find out just where she belongs; she’s always had a craving for knowledge which has brought her to so many places and to meet so many people here in Caido. We can’t wait to see what else is in store for her!
Congratulations, Maea!
Credits
Court of the Fallen was created in October of 2018 by Odd, Honey, and Crooked.
Skinning and hosting by the epically talented Kaons, and functionality fanciness by the coding magic of Neowulf. If you ever see either of them around, make sure to show them some love!
Oh, Fox is just fine. You know, as soon as he rolls the allogator off his fuuuuuucking leg. "Mm, this thing is just real heavy," he grunts, using the leg that's free to shove at the dead weight, managing to kick himself free and flopping back against the muddy riverbank, chest heaving. He's soaking wet and covered in dirt, but he's alive and the gator is dead, and that, he thinks, is a win.
"Thanks for the help." He gazes up at Tal (somewhat upside down right now, but it's fine), his tail flicking a small protest at being unceremoniously laid upon. "I'm Fox, by the way. Nice to meet you?" The Ancient is grinning now, because is it nice, really? Oh well.
Boreal was perfectly happy to grab the allogator's tail and help pull it off Fox. And then continue to pull and tug at it, growling fiercely as the poor beastie was reduced to a dog-sized dragon's chew toy. Tal just shook his head ruefully and sheathed his Dagger, ambling over to the man - Fox? - who he could probably have helped disentangle from the gator himself, but it looked like the other guy had it handled.
"I'm Tal, an' you're welcome. Thanks for uh. Distractin' it." That was... that was definitely what Fox had been doing by riding it. A masterful distraction. Yeah. The courier crouched down nearby and bent to study the allogator, poking its hard skin and wiggling one of its claws all while keeping a wary on it to make sure it wasn't just playing dead.
He spared a glance back as he caught a glimpse of the wiggling spade tail, and finally noticed the little horn nubbins on Fox's head. But that definitely wasn't a goat's tail... "Are you, uh, from around here?" He asked, toootally casually.
Fox can't help but offer a wry smile up at Tal for that - not thanks for warning me it was following me, not thanks for breathing fire at it, no no. But they're both alive at least, and he shifts to get his elbows beneath himself and watch the is-it-dead test take place. "I was hired to kill it as well," he says. "You mentioned someone requested you come and take care of it, before. I guess they must have figured I was eaten."
And it would be funny if it wasn't almost true, Fox using a muddy sleeve to try and wipe at a muddy cheek, which unsurprisingly doesn't work at all. "Mm?" He raises a brow at the question, sitting himself up further and freeing the flailing, unhappy tail from where it's been pinned beneath his body. "I live here," he says, though the tilt of his head and the small smile on his face invites Tal to ask the question he's really got.
Fox would soon learn that Tal wasn't the best at manners. But his heart eventually got to the right place usually and his aim with his Dagger was pretty decent, so it was up to the Ancient whether that was worth dealing with the rest of the package that came with it.
"Could be," he agreed easily with the other guy's assessment. Then he shrugged and edged closer to the gator's mouth, using a short stick to lift up the skin and examine the teeth. "Coulda been two different people, too, I guess. Sounds like this sucker was gettin' t'be a real problem for everyone in the area." Given its size, it was easy to see why.
He slanted another glance back at Fox, who was definitely more goat than fox or, uh... something... else? Tal cleared his throat awkwardly naturally and didn't notice when his stick missed the gator's lip and poked into its nostril instead. "Oh yeah? You, uh. Happen to be an Attuned, by chance?" Smoother than a fresh jar of Skippy.
Luckily for Tal, Fox has dealt with people a lot rougher around the edges and much less likely to help out a guy being attacked by a giant murder log, so he's already in the hunter's good books. "Mm, that's a good point. Well, if each of us takes a tooth or a claw, I guess we can both get paid for it," he figures, though the other man deciding to pick the allogator's nose feels like he's making it personal against the creature somehow.
Tal does eventually get to his question as Fox is shifting to his knees to inspect which bit of the gator to take as proof of killing it, and he offers him a smile for his trouble. "Ancient," he tells him. "But I was Ascended before the war, so I still live here."
"Yeah, sounds good t'me..." Tal mumbled his agreement, distracted by the twitchy little tail and his own twitchy little questions. He glanced back at the allogator as his stick caught on something and didn't move the way he wanted it to, realizing belatedly where he'd been poking it. Boreal gave a mighty heave on the tail with a happy growl, jerking the gator a solid three inches across the muddy turf and freeing it from the courier's desecrations, and he hurriedly dropped the offending stick as Fox answered.
And what an answer it was.
"Whoa, really?" There'd been rumors, of course, but... "What's it like? We don't really get many--" Or any, really "Ancients in Halo. D'you really eat fire an' have acid for blood?" Among other wild stories about the forgotten race that had resurfaced after the War.
Fox has been about to sever a gator claw with the knife from his boot when Boreal hefts the creature out of range, and he offers the dragon an amused grin before scooting in the same direction and getting to work. "Mmhm, really," he says, glancing up at Tal and raising his eyebrows at the parade of questions.
"Er," he begins awkwardly. "I don't know any Ancients who bleed acid or eat fire. But fire doesn't hurt us," he tells Tal. "And it's fine, I guess. Sorry to disappoint." Laughing, Fox wipes his hands on his pants and sits back from the allogator.
"I think a lot of us are just like anybody else. The older Ancients are a little different from what I've seen - the ones who were asleep.
Boreal paused, looking at Fox expectantly. Her own scaly tail gave a small wag of anticipation as Tal grabbed on to the gator's snout and lifted the jaw, aiming for some teeth--
She gave another tug and a mighty shake of her head, but luckily for both men the carcass didn't move much that time and they were able to make progress on procuring their trophies.
"...Oh." Tal tried not to look too disappointed as the cool-factor of the Ancients went down a few notches. "Well, bein' fire-proof is a neat trick." He offered the latter in an awkward attempt at consolation.
But the hunter's next statement had him pausing with a handful of sharp, bloody teeth, tilting his head at the Ancient. "Whaddya mean by 'different?'" Bigger horns, maybe?
"It's better than the opposite, which was how it was when I was Ascended," Fox agrees with a grin, once again bending to his task and working on severing a gator claw. Spaded tail flicking with his concentration, once the claw is finally free, he tucks it away somewhere safe. (Or relatively safe, given that he's soaking wet).
"Mm?" Glancing back at Tal and finally straightening up away from the gargantuan body, Fox wrinkles his nose. "They're just... more in tune with the more violent parts of being what we are," he hazards, not wanting to spook his new acquaintance. "Ancients need to kill things - it's called bloodlust. I do it when I have to, but the older Ancients... it's their whole lifestyle."
"Yeah, okay. Fair," Tal conceded after a moment's thought. Being highly flammable seemed like a realbad time to the Halovian, and he was pretty sure Batty Bart had said something about Ascended and fire, too. Maybe he could ask Frey about adding fire resistance to his Cuff the next time he prayed to Them...
As the men claimed their sharp, pointy proofs of success and Boreal claimed the whole ass rest of the allogator, Tal learned something else that was new. "Um. Excuse me?" He squinted up at Fox, standing slowly as that delightful little nugget of knowledge percolated through his skull. "Whaddya mean, 'need' t'kill shit? Like, ursurs eatin' meat?" The word was 'carnivores,' but Tal had always been better with concrete examples.
Fox can confirm that it is, indeed, a realbad time to have to run the risk of catching fire in so much as a bit of sun. It's one of his favourite things about having become an Ancient, honestly, and come Longheat he plans to take full advantage of it. It's a shame, really, that they can't chat about the seasons or the weather, and the hunter meticulously wipes the gator blood from his fingers, chewing thoughtfully on the inside of his cheek as Tal speaks again.
"I suppose you could say it's like that," he says with a nod. "But it's like separate... sort of hunger, I suppose you could say. I'm not sure I'm explaining myself very well." Rubbing at the back of his head, he hopes the courier can forgive him - it's not like he has this conversation with many people. "The main thing is I'm not hungry in that way right now, so... you know. Everything is fine."
If anyone was in a position to judge someone for explaining things poorly, it wasn't Tal. He listened intently to what Fox was saying, but just gave a shrug at the other man's uncertainty. "Not really," he said with his usual social grace. "So, if y'were hungry... in 'that' way... everything wouldn't be fine?" He wrinkled his nose, brows furrowed as he tried to piece together what the other man was saying and what he meant.
"An' y'can't just... I dunno... eat some jerky or somethin' when y'get hungry for meat or blood or... whatever?" He wrapped the teeth in a handkerchief and tucked it into his pocket, but his focus was on Fox out of curiosity as much as confused wariness.
Usually as forthright as he can be, it's with an increasingly awkward hunch of his shoulders that Fox does his best to answer Tal's questions, however intrusive they might be getting. "Well, yes and no?" He hazards an answer. "It's not like a switch flips and suddenly I'm feral. But obviously the longer I leave it..." He shrugs. "And that's what I meant about other Ancients. I wouldn't hurt any one, but I can't speak for them."
As for just eating some jerky or somethin', he gives the other man a smile that's much more of a grimace, honestly. "Would that I could," he says slowly, before finally finding his backbone under his tongue somewhere. "Do you mind if we change the subject? It's not my favourite thing to think about."
"Right. So, Ancients get really hangry." Tal nodded knowingly, having suffered from that state himself a few times. He still wasn't entirely clear on 'killing' versus 'eating' but he was more or less getting the gist of it, he thought.
Probably.
Socially oblivious, the courier probably would have kept going if Fox hadn't spoken up. He blinked, then his eyes widened in a silent ooooh, right and he gave a sheepish nod. "Yeah, o'course. Sorry. Soooo. What do you, uh. Want to... talk... about?" Ah yes, the small talk part of the conversation had come, and now Tal was sweating significantly harder than he had when facing the allogator.
