Username: KiTelli
Dino’s name: Vix--short for Vixen. She's as sly as a fox, she is... Plus the placement of her markings is vaguely fox-like.
Dino’s Gender:Female
Brief Dino Personality: Vix is a clever girl; she's smarter than most people would guess her to be. She has a sort of passive-aggressive attitude: if you reprimand her for something, you may or may not find your pack high in a tree the next morning. She learns quickly, often picking up new skills simply by watching others. But she also becomes bored easily, and thus chaos ensues. One of her favorite things to do: pull at Adriyn's braid with her teeth.
Rider:
Adriyn is a stubborn and clever twenty-year old whose personality matches her fiery hair. Though somewhat small in stature, she makes up for it with her agility. A skilled archer, Adriyn is certainly a girl to content with.
Description: She’s small, only about 5’4”. Adriyn has long, dark red hair she keeps in a braid down her back and brilliant green eyes with a ring of gold around the pupils. She is thin, but still athletic. Once quite fair as a child, her skin is now a golden tan. Her clothing is usually boots, leggings and a loose fitting tunic. When she ‘suits up’ she has a leather chest piece and leg guards and carries a small round shield at her back, along with her quiver of arrows and her bow slung over her shoulder. She never goes without her leather bracers/fingerless gloves. She wears thinner ones for every-day but has tougher, thicker ones for her armor. She keeps some small knives on her at all times, and she is quite skilled at throwing them. She can move easily through the sparse brush without being seen or heard, and has a habit of appearing seemingly out of nowhere and then disappearing as quickly as she came. This is aided on occasion by a full length, lightweight mottled cloak; one side mimicking the greens of a forest, the other side the browns, tans and greys of the desert.
Personality: Tenacious and impulsive with a sense of almost insatiable curiosity, Adriyn has a tendency to get herself into trouble, but is usually able to get herself out just as easily. So long as nobody was hurt and she didn't get caught, she calls any escapade a victory. She views authority with respect, but also as something that can be bent or disregarded if necessary. What is ‘necessary’ depends on the situation. For her, nothing is ‘black and white,’ everything is shades of grey. She has a hard time trusting others, but when trust is earned, she is very loyal. If that trust is broken, it is very hard to earn it back, if she’ll ever trust that person again at all. Though she does get along with most other people, she does enjoy spending time alone, among nature and animals or practicing with her bow or throwing knives. She has a witty, sarcastic sense of humor that she generally keeps to herself, and will often stifle laughter or a grin at her own thoughts.
Parents: Mother, (Tenna) who is a healer. She has never met her father and her mother doesn't talk about him much.
Siblings: Her twin brother Aleksi, (Al or Alek for short. She calls him Ali, and only she gets away with it.), who will never ride a Dino; he broke his right leg severely when he was a child and it grew infected, despite their mother's best efforts. It never developed correctly and now he can't move it correctly. He seems fine with his lot, though, and uses his drawing talents to make maps of the tribe's territory.
SO: Straight
Significant other/crush: None, though she can, at times and depending on circumstances, be a bit of a flirt.
Rider’s Tribe:Mat'iri. She grew up in the trees, feeling just as at home in the sparse branches and small shrubs as in her family's hovel. She has explored as much of the land as she has been able to, and only wants to discover.
Do I plan to train this Dino?: Yes, in writing form. I don’t have a tablet and hate mouse-drawing, so I rarely use the oekaki. I may upload a traditionally drawn image once in a while. At any rate, I find it easier to capture moments in writing than in an image. I like word pictures better anyway.
A short story featuring Adriyn and this lovely Dino: Run.
That one word echoed in Adriyn’s mind as she dodged around a corner, ducking into one of the deep shadows that were common among the Mat’huen tunnels. Back against the wall, the redhead sagged to the ground, her body exhausted yet everything on high alert, adrenaline pumping through her system. Her own heartbeat pounded in her ears, and for a brief moment she almost thought that it would be heard farther down the tunnel.
She needed to get back home. The tunnel entrance had to be close by; she hadn’t wandered that far. Taking a deep breath and taking her bearings, she ghosted quickly and quietly from her hiding place and back the way she came.
There! A faint glow told her where she would come through back into the heart of her own land, the tunnel entrance carefully hidden among a small grove of trees. Oh, how the tribe leader will be happy to find the tunnel! The Mat’huen had been raiding; they were just small excursions into the Mat’iri territory, but now a patrol could be stationed to keep them in their own territory where they belong.
Adriyn ran the last few meters and scrambled out among the trees. Hands on her knees, she bend forward and panted, glad to finally be breathing the fresh air of her home versus the stale, acrid smell of the tunnels.
Brushing herself off, she was ready to run again when an angry roar split the air behind her. It had the metallic ring of stone, and she realized it was coming from the tunnel. Someone was coming. Had she been followed? The events of her little jaunt replayed in her head. No; nobody knew she was down there, Mat’iri or Mat’huen. Perhaps, in her mad dash for the exit, she has somehow alerted one of their warriors to her presence; whether they knew she was human or merely thought her to be a lost animal that had wandered into the tunnel was another story. She didn’t want to stick around to find out, either.
But they were getting closer; she could hear the massive dino’s footsteps echoing down the tunnel, each stomp just a bit louder and clearer than the last.
Adriyn scurried like a giant spider along the ground, under a scrubby patch of bushes and hopefully beyond the rider’s notice. She absently wished she had the time to have gone for the larger patch just a few feet away, though dwelling on what could have been wouldn't do her any good anyhow. Shoving the thought away, she turned to face the way into Mat'huen terriroty, trusting her patterned cloak to hide her beneath the shrubs.
A moment later a Bernikesaur, saddled and in black war paint emerged with his rider dressed in full war regalia on his back. The man turned his head slowly, surveying the area, mumbling in low tones for only himself and his mount to hear.
The hairs on the back of Adriyn’s neck prickled, but not because of the threat mere yards in front of her…no…there was something else…
Risking a small movement, the redhead turned toward the larger grouping of bushes to her left, and was suddenly glad she hadn’t dove into that patch after all. A thousand curses raced across her train of thought as she stared directly into the bright blue eyes of a wild Bernikesaur. How had she not seen this animal before?! Surely something that large couldn't hide so easily.
The beast exhaled, its breath hot on Adriyn’s face and she let out an involuntary whimper in response.
“What was that?” The young woman's heart seemed to leap into her throat. Oh no. The rider had heard her.
I’m dead. In an instant she ran a few different outcomes through her head.
Option one: Stay here, hidden in the bushes. Either be eaten or, if this thing isn’t hungry, get caught. Dead. Option two: Run. Either trigger the predator/prey chase response in this dino or in the other one. Or get a spear in my back. Dead. Option three: Slink back to tunnel. This dino follows me or the other one will find me when he goes back. Or there’s another rider waiting just inside. Dead. She wished desperately that she had grabbed her bow and arrows before rushing out this morning, and thought for a moment about using her throwing knives.
No, that would only prolong the inevitable; the rider is in armor and a Bernikesaur’s hide is too thick for a knife to do much damage. She was stuck between a rock and a hard place...take her chances here with the wild one or out there with the captured one and his rider. She shoved the fear back into the pit of her stomach so she could focus.
Moving only her eyes, she looked back at the rider on his dino; the animal’s massive head was sniffing around, moving right toward her scant patch of cover. She looked back at those blue eyes within an arm’s reach of her, and the dino blinked quizzically.
No. She was not going out like this. The very least she could do was to die fighting. Every muscle tensed in that moment, prepared to spring from her hiding place. Deciding to go for the rival tribe member, she adjusted her feet underneath her and slipped a knife from her leather bracer, the blue-eyed dino watching her every movement with a sort of mild curiosity. She wondered if this is how a mouse felt when being watched by a jackal before being eaten.
In the time it takes for the heart to skip a beat, the situation took a drastic turn. With no warning, the Bernikesaur with blue eyes leapt from the shrubs, shrieking in anger at the other and his rider. To Adriyn’s slight surprise, this girl was actually a bit bigger than the other dino and mottled like her home-dyed cloak. The other dino rocked backward and staggered a few paces, letting out a scream of confusion and surprise mingled with fear. The wild dino darted at the other Bernikesaur, snapping at the rider and hissing in a low tone that was felt more than heard. For a moment the two beasts sized each other up, the rider pulling at one rein and giving his animal some good kicks in the side, trying to egg him on. With a final roar, the wild female charged, pounding the dirt with every powerful stride, kicking up twigs and rocks in her wake. The other dino wheeled and ran, nearly dumping his rider in the dust, and sprinted toward the tunnel entrance.
Adriyn watched this scene, bewildered and shocked. The blue eyed dino skidded to a stop and turned her massive head, blinking those blue eyes at the redhead that now stood up out of the bushes. She almost wanted to laugh.
This thought was stifled, however, as the beast ran her tongue over her teeth, looking suddenly even more keenly interested in the young woman.
She couldn’t believe this. The amazing scene that just played out before her and she still may get eaten?
“No.” holding up a finger, she waggled it at the animal. “Not going to happen.” Her voice was stern, though she wasn't sure how much good it would do; surely the beast didn't understand her. She backed away, toward the edge of the copse of trees, never turning her back to the massive animal until she had clear running room. She turned and ran flat-out until she reached the village, her adrenaline pumping as hard as it ever has. Her entire body was shaking by the time she reached her family’s hovel.
She didn’t say a word to anyone about what had happened.
But she could have sworn she saw a blue eye glowing in her window that night.