Colin's posts

"Well, whomever taught you was smart." he told her. "This world is cruel and unforgiving if you happen to have a bad dice roll on your birth." he lamented. "Being able to get out of any situation is invaluable." he went on.

"And given that you were able to take that beast down, then you were taught quite well." he continued, putting the claws in a small cloth bag he had.

"I'm always looking for help for... well... anything." he then sighed.

"But very few people are willing to give me a second glance." he admitted.

"Regardless, we should have time before people start coming back to this area. They might have heard the commotion and some might be curious enough to see what's happened, but it will be at least another hour or so before some serious numbers come in, after hearing about the death of that thing." he reasoned.

"And since you're the one that knows where we'd be going, it's probably best if you're the one doing the teleporting." he added at the end.

"Got it." he replied.

"Be right back." he told her, before disappearing in a light red translucent bubble of what looked like water.

About 5 minutes later, he was back, and his hands were full. She saw the tooth she needed... and it was a BIG one... but she also saw that he had all of the creature's claws on him as well.

"...." he was silent as she looked at them, before chuckling.

"Force of habit." he said.

"Because of my lifestyle, I've learned to make weapons." he told her. "Crude ones, but still." he went on. "These claws would attach nicely to gloves for more effective hand-to-hand combat." he reasoned.

He raised an eyebrow when she said this.

"Quite knowledgeable." he commented.

"I'll go get one." he told her.

"Anything else?" he asked. "To which, I mean, anything YOU want from it?" he asked her.

"You have to bring back one of its teeth, yes, but what about for you, personally?" he asked further. "After all, taking that down on your own is quite a feat." he reasoned.

"You the sort of have a victory trophy from things like that?"

He just smiled.

"Do what you love, and you'll live a full life." he told her.

"Maybe not long, but a life not enjoyed, is a life wasted." he continued, before making his way to one of the windows, looking out into the distance, and sighing quietly.

"I'll come with you." he said.

"I can't stay here. And I don't know where I would go next, anyway." he admitted.

"So I got nothing to lose at this point." he shrugged.

"You need any sort of trophy from that tiger or anything?" he asked.

He just laughed about the grandchildren comment.

"Well, it'll be the first time in my life a woman will be hassling me TO give her grandchildren with her daughter, and not demanding I stay away, lest she kill me." he told her, before heaving a small sigh.

"And... oh?" he asked.

"What you do?" he asked her. "What's that?" he inquired.

"I assume it either has something to do with being in this location, or the beast you just slayed." he then commented.

"But care to give specifics?"

The man paused when he heard her offer, and looked at her.

"...go back with you?" he asked.

"Are you certain?" he asked her, before pausing again.

"Well... most of the reasons one could use to dissuade you would be null and void, anyway." he commented. "Who and what I am won't matter, as you've suffered the slings and arrows that come from that stigma as well." he reasoned. "I'd ask if you trusted me enough, but it seems you do... and I've done nothing to say I can't be trusted, nor do I wish to put that impression forward." he went on.

"...which is to say, I promise I AM trustworthy." he clarified.

"I suppose the only real question is... if you feel I would be a burden or not." he then said further.

"Or, rather, would your mother think me as one?"

"...oh." the man replied... before pausing. "Oh..." he repeated, as the gears turned. "Oh!" he then exclaimed, having put all the pieces together, that horse finally crossing the finish line.

"Oh, I... I see." he said, looking at her once more. "I... well... yes, yes you WOULD know what I've gone through." he said further. "...and odds are everything you listed is from personal experience, or some form of it." he then mumbled.

"Well, then we can at least relate on what it's like to be feared and loathed, and treated as a plague." he lamented.

"...which is sad, really." he went on.

"A gorgeous young lady such as yourself should never be subjected to anything akin to that." he said further, slipping in a compliment, whether intentional or unintentional.

"You're surviving, though. And seeing as you killed that Basilisk Tiger, you seem to be more than capable of handling yourself in most given situations."

The man was frozen for a moment, almost stunned.

"I... uh..." he stammered.

"Uh, well..." he mumbled.

"Well... yeah, actually." he said. "Yeah, a lot of those HAVE happened to me... or people attempted it." he confirmed. "I always manage to escape, though. Leaving a trail of blood in my wake." he lamented.

"Everyone thinks or assumes I'm some cruel murderer or torturer... but all my killing's been done in self-defense." he admitted.

"How... did you know?" he asked.

"You speak as though you've been through such horrors." he commented.

The man just sighed as he looked at her, before letting the blood fall down into the creature's face in a small splatter.

"No." he said.

"They don't." he told her.

"It's why I was living here." he went on. "Nobody came here because of that tiger, and I knew how to make it stop in its tracks without killing it. Stopped it from attacking ME, and kept others away." he explained.

"Was a nice arrangement." he told her further.

"But, now that it's dead, people will start coming back here, so I should scram." he reasoned.

"Otherwise bad stuff's going to start happening. Again."

"...damn it all." he growled.

"Fine." he said.

"I can be long-gone before you're capable of stopping me anyway." he mumbled in a VERY ominous statement. He then walked over to a part of the room where there seemed to be a loose and rotted part of the ceiling. He narrowed his eyes and looked up for a moment, before thumping it with a pole. Hard.

Once he did, a hole formed in the ceiling, and what looked to be a rabid sabre-toothed marsupial about the size of a raccoon fell down. It hissed at him and Demi, ready to attack, before the man extending his hand. Once he did, the creature froze, and collapsed to the floor, silent and still. After that, he moved his fingers slightly, and blood started to ooze out from the creature's mouth... literally rising up into the air.

"The things are pests, anyway. Nobody'll miss this little troublemaker."

"......." the man was now... disconcertingly silent for a moment.

"...it's blood." he told her.

"From various places. Mostly animals." he continued.

"That's all." he went on.

"I defend myself when the time comes." he told her further.

"........" again, he was silent, before sighing.

"That's not going to satiate your curiosity, is it?" he asked.

"Well, that info was wrong." he replied.

"But... you managed it, anyway. Which is a feat in and of itself." he told her.

"Regardless, with that thing dead, odds are more people might start coming back to this area of the city once more." he continued. "Because it was nesting so close, everyone abandoned this sector." he went on.

"Was good for ME, anyway. Meant I could live here." he reasoned with a shrug.

"Anyway, I'm glad you're okay." he continued.

"...and please excuse the mess." he then commented. "Blood just... gets everywhere, and it's so hard to clean up and stop from staining, I just gave up a long time ago." he laughed.

"Good." the man replied.

"You'll need to take it easy for another day or so." he then told her. "The Basilisk Tiger... well, its venom is... nasty." he muttered. "It wouldn't have been long before your entire body seized up and you just died from full complete paralysis and shutdown." he said further.

"Thankfully I managed to extract most of the venom from your system, but there's still a small amount left inside you." he warned.

"You'll probably feel stiff and queasy unless you get proper medical attention." he continued.

"But you should be good to teleport, or be teleported, within a half-hour or so." he added.

"...also, why WERE you fighting that monstrous beast?" he asked her.

"Nobody's been foolish enough to attempt to take it down, let alone succeed." he said.

As she looked around, she saw a glass container on a desk on the other side of the room. It was jar-like, and inside was a strange fluid. It was almost completely colourless, but she swore she saw a light tinge of green to the translucent fluid.

About 30 seconds later, the man appeared in the room again, the quartz she had dropped earlier in his hand.

He approached her and set it down close to her.

"Had to go and get that." he told her. "After all, don't want anyone to abscond with it." he reasoned.

"Anyway, how are you?" he asked.

"Feeling better than before, I'm guessing, due to you actually sitting up now.